487 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 


THE 

DECLENSION  OF 
HENRY  D'ALBIAC 


BY 

V.  GOLDIE 


NEW  YORK 

FREDERICK  A.  STOKES  COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


Copyright,  1913,  by 
FREDERICK  A.  STOKES  COMPANY 


All  rights  reserved  including  that  of  translation  into  foreign 
languages,  including  the  Scandinavian. 


January,  JQI3 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 


2135911   ' 


The  Declension  of  Henry 
D'Albiac 


THEIR  first  meeting  took  place  in  circumstances 
that  smacked  of  the  Homeric,  and  needs  the  nerv- 
ous English  of  a  Fielding  for  adequate  presenta- 
tion. Walking  home  along  Parliament  Street 
from  a  dinner-party  in  Whitehall  Place,  his  head 
pleasantly  awhirl  with  memories  of  his  beloved's 
graciousness  of  demeanour  during  the  evening,  he 
found  himself,  before  he  was  aware  of  anything 
amiss,  caught  in  the  rush  of  a  considerable  crowd 
that  struggled  and  seethed  about  the  end  of  Down- 
ing Street.  His  absent-minded  attempts  to  extri- 
cate himself  led  only  to  a  more  intricate  involution, 
so  that,  against  all  his  inclinations,  he  found  him- 
self borne  to  the  very  heart  of  the  disturbance; 
now  aided  by  an  eddying  of  the  mob,  again  by  a 
violent  hand-thrust  from  one  of  the  many  police- 
men who  were  stirring  up  the  gathering,  in  a  vain 
attempt  to  disperse  it.  His  temper  considerably 
ruffled  by  this  mischance  and  these  physical  in- 
dignities, Henry  D'Albiac  looked  about  him  for  a 
means  of  escape,  with  an  attempt  at  the  same  time 


2      THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

to  realise  the  cause  of  the  trouble.  Although,  so 
far  as  the  darkness  permitted  him  to  see,  the  crowd 
was  composed  of  all  classes  and  varieties  of  human 
beings,  yet  the  unusual  number  of  women  and  the 
sound  of  feminine  voices  raised  in  battle-cry  soon 
told  him  that  he  was  involuntarily  assisting  at  a 
Suffrage  Demonstration;  and  the  discovery  did  lit- 
tle to  improve  his  ill-humour.  The  thought  of  these 
howling  and  unsexed  creatures,  thus  suddenly  su- 
perimposed on  the  hyperdelicate  image  of  his 
heart's  mistress,  filled  him  with  a  positive  nausea, 
and  redoubled  his  anxiety  to  free  himself  from  such 
vulgar  and  violent  surroundings.  A  vigorous  ef- 
fort to  fight  his  way  out  was,  however,  but  slowly 
rewarded;  and,  but  for  hurriedly  apologetic  expla- 
nations to  an  indignant  constable,  seemed  likely  at 
one  moment  to  lead  to  his  arrest  as  a  participant 
in  this  odious  and  insensate  street-fight.  Still  he 
was  making  recognisable  progress,  when  there 
came  a  new  diversion;  the  crowd  was  violently 
riven  by  a  body  of  police,  who  drove  a  lane  before 
them,  down  which  another  of  their  number  fol- 
lowed thrusting  before  him  an  arrested  rioter.  The 
foolish  woman  was  perhaps  of  about  half  the 
weight  of  the  mighty  guardian  of  the  peace, 
and  as  he  had  secured  her  with  a  "  lock  "  which 
had  been  taught  him  as  adapted  for  the  apprehen- 
sion of  homicides  and  armed  burglars,  she  was  only 
enjoying  herself  indifferently.  The  inclination  to 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC      3 

disgusted  scorn  received  a  sudden  irrational  check 
in  D'Albiac's  mind  as  she  was  led  towards  him. 
Obviously  she  had  struggled,  for  her  hat  was  lost 
and  her  brown  hair  tumbled  about  her  face.  Just 
as  she  reached  him,  she  made  what  was  plainly  only 
a  conscientiously  hopeless  effort  to  release  herself 
by  throwing  herself  violently  forward;  her  com- 
plexion was  as  white  as  death,  and  her  eyes  closed 
as  she  did  so,  and  the  feeble  attempt  was  hardly 
even  realised  by  her  gigantic  custodian,  who  con- 
tinued to  push  her  forward  fatally  through  the 
crowd,  which  surged  about  her  path  with  hand- 
clappings  and  cries  of  admiration  and  encourage- 
ment. D'Albiac  could  not  have  explained  after- 
wards the  reason  of  his  action;  nor,  indeed,  was  it 
due  to  any  direct  volition  on  his  part;  the  glimpse 
of  a  white,  tortured  face,  a  national  love  of  the 
other  sex,  the  warmth  of  his  own  temperament,  the 
irritation  of  his  previous  state  of  mind,  no  doubt 
all  contributed  to  the  motive  power.  However 
that  may  have  been,  he  suddenly  found  himself  in 
violent  motion,  conscious  only  of  overwhelming 
rage  and  vigour.  Like  many  of  his  own  class  of 
his  compatriots,  he  had  been  instructed  in  various 
ingenious  methods  of  offence  and  defence,  and  had 
thoroughly  trained  a  naturally  athletic  body ;  and  in 
less  than  a  moment  of  time  he  had,  all  uncon- 
sciously, fallen  like  a  thunderbolt  on  the  policeman 
and  his  charge,  and,  by  the  exhibition  of  one  of 


4      THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

these  pleasant  devices,  had  freed  the  woman  from 
the  man's  grip  and  interposed  a  dozen  members  of 
the  crowd  between  the  hunted  and  the  hunter. 
Fortune  aided  them  at  the  moment  by  a  sudden 
wash  back  of  the  whole  gathering  from  the  mouth 
of  Downing  Street,  which  was  rapidly  cleared  by  a 
strong  force  of  police  to  allow  of  the  passing  out 
of  a  closed  motor  car,  amidst  a  storm  of  hisses  and 
booing.  The  disappointed  policeman  drifted  on 
this  wave  yet  further  away  from  his  quarry,  and, 
with  that  impartiality  that  has  ever  been  the  proud- 
est boast  of  our  island  law,  arrested  a  poorly- 
dressed  and  astonished  bystander  to  compensate  for 
his  loss.  The  demonstrators  falling  into  a  wolf- 
like  pursuit  of  the  fleeting  car  and  drawing  the 
police  in  their  wake,  D'Albiac  found  himself,  in  a 
few  moments,  standing  by  the  entrance  of  the  Pub- 
lic Prosecutor's  offices  looking  down  on  the  rescued 
rioter,  who  sat  gasping  and  rocking  backwards  and 
forwards  on  the  lowest  step  for  some  little  time  be- 
fore she  seemed  to  realise  her  position. 

Despite  a  returning  sense  of  disgust  at  the  scene 
and  shame  at  his  own  share  in  it,  D'Albiac  did  not 
feel  that  he  could  leave  the  poor,  silly  creature  in 
this  state ;  and  he  shuffled  nervously  and  impatiently 
from  one  foot  to  another,  as  he  watched  her  draw- 
ing a  succession  of  deep  breaths,  mechanically  pok- 
ing and  patting  her  soft,  wildly  disordered  hair, 
and  every  now  and  again  raising  and  straightening 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC      5 

her  left  arm.  Her  clothing,  which  seemed  to  have 
been  designed  for  athletic  purposes,  and  consisted 
of  a  knitted  jersey  and  shortish  dark  skirt,  had  not 
obviously  suffered  in  the  conflict;  and  by  the  time 
she  had  partially  tidied  her  hair  she  bore  no  marks 
of  the  late  encounter  beyond  the  whiteness  of  her 
cheeks,  and  even  into  them  a  faint  touch  of  pink 
was  creeping  by  degrees.  He  had  made  up  his 
mind  indeed  to  leave  her  with  a  word  of  formality 
when  she  turned  her  face  upwards  to  him,  and  he 
stopped,  looking  back  at  her  with  a  newly  awak- 
ened interest.  The  woman  was  pretty ;  no,  that  was 
hardly  a  right,  or,  at  any  rate,  an  exhaustive  de- 
scription; curiously  interesting.  The  wide-browed, 
alert  face  might  almost,  but  for  the  bright  softness 
of  the  mouth,  have  belonged  to  an  unusually  good- 
looking  school  boy;  the  eyes,  set  well  apart  beneath 
fine  and  quaintly  squared  eyebrows,  burnt  with 
dancing  blue  fire ;  the  cheek  bones  were  rather  high, 
the  face  below  them  narrowing  into  a  cleft  and 
rounded  chin.  Her  long,  slender  neck,  which  the 
low  collar  of  her  jersey  left  exposed,  and  her  small, 
bare  hands  were  delicately  white,  and  her  slight 
figure  seemed  active  and  graceful.  As  she  sat  look- 
ing whimsically  up  at  him  in  silence,  there  was 
something  in  the  lively,  quick  face  that  removed  all 
his  previous  anxiety  to  consider  his  strange  ad- 
venture terminated.  For  the  moment,  his  natural 
attraction  towards  a  good-looking  woman  entirely 


6      THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

routed  the  memory  of  the  odious  circumstances  in 
which  he  had  encountered  her;  and  it  was  with 
something  more  than  his  usual  courtesy  that  he  of- 
fered her  his  hand  to  assist  her  to  rise.  She  ac- 
cepted it  with  entire  friendliness,  and,  once  on  her 
feet,  stood  for  a  short  while  supporting  herself 
against  the  stone  balustrade,  holding  one  hand  to 
her  forehead,  and  opening  and  shutting  her  eyes 
experimentally  from  time  to  time. 

Presently  she  gave  a  deep  sigh,  and  followed  it 
with  a  quick,  radiant  smile. 

"  What's  happened  ?  "  she  asked  in  a  soft,  clear 
voice,  her  head  a  little  on  one  side  for  the  question. 
"Did  he  get  out?" 

"  Did  he  — "  repeated  D'Albiac,  enquiringly ;  and 
then  with  a  memory  of  the  closed  motor  car,  "  Oh, 
yes,  I  suppose  he  did.  Someone  did  —  a  Limousine 
—  and  the  crowd — " 

"  That's  the  man,"  said  she,  with  a  regretful 
shake  of  the  head.  "  I  s'pose  they  didn't  catch 
him?" 

"  So  far  as  I  could  see  the  car  left  the  crowd  far 
behind,"  said  D'Albiac  with  grave  disapproval, 
which,  however,  the  woman  did  not  appear  to  no- 
tice. She  was  again  bending  and  straightening  her 
arm  and,  as  she  did  so,  made  a  little  grimace  of 
pain. 

"  Oh,  well,"  she  said  in  an  off-hand  manner, 
"  then  there's  nothing  more  to  be  done  to-night. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  H^NRY  D'ALBIAC      7 

Did  you  see  what  happened  to  me?  Why  did  the 
policeman  let  me  go,  do  you  know?" 

D'Albiac  assumed  an  air  of  exaggerated  uncon- 
cern. "  I  couldn't  see  you  treated  so,"  he  said,  with 
an  upward  jerk  of  his  chin.  "  Whatever  one  may 
think  — " 

"Oh,  it  was  you?     You  rescued  me?" 

He  bowed  slightly. 

"  That  was  very  kind  of  you ;  you  might  have  got 
into  trouble,"  she  said,  warmly.  "  And  you're  not 
one  of  us,  are  you  ?  " 

He  shook  his  head,  with  a  touch  of  contempt,  that 
he  could  not  altogether  conceal;  and  he  was  aware 
from  a  flashing  dimple  in  his  companion's  cheek 
that  she  observed  it. 

"  No,  clearly  not,"  she  said,  softly,  with  a  smile. 
"  Well,  thanks  very  much.  Of  course  I'd  rather 
you  hadn't;  but  you  couldn't  be  expected  to  know 
that;  and  that  doesn't  make  it  any  less  kind  and 
brave  of  you." 

There  was  that  in  the  ring  of  her  voice  as  she 
spoke,  something  so  unusually  sincere  and  kind, 
that  the  Frenchman  was  conscious  of  an  unwilling 
attraction  to  the  personality  of  this  female  rough. 

"  Rather  I  hadn't  ?  But  you  were  being  taken  to 
prison,"  he  protested. 

"  Well,  that  was  exactly  where  I  wanted  to  be 
taken,"  she  replied.  "  My  case  is  like  that  of  the 
injudiciously  rescued  suicide.  I'd  got  all  the  un- 


8      THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

pleasantness  over,  and  then  I  was  resuscitated,  so 
to  speak.  They  take  such  a  long  time  sometimes 
making  up  their  minds  to  run  you  in,  particularly 
if  they  think  you  want  to  be.  Then  I'm  not  very 
strong,  you  see,  and  I  can't  make  myself  such  a 
nuisance  as  some  of  our  women.  I'd  had  three 
tries  at  one  policeman,  and  he  would  only  shake 
me  by  the  throat,  and  say,  '  Now,  then,  Mrs.  Evans, 
now  then ! '  in  a  soothing,  motherly  manner ;  and 
then  turn  his  attention  to  somebody  else.  So  at 
last  I  slipped  through  the  line  and  got  half-way  up 
the  street  before  the  man  you  saw  me  with  caught 
me.  I  think  he  was  a  new  hand;  he  didn't  know 
me—" 

"  Do  most  of  them  ?  "  asked  D'Albiac,  aghast. 

"  Well,  a  good  many  of  tht  '  A '  Division  do," 
answered  Mrs.  Evans,  casually,  still  examining  her 
injured  arm.  "  Ff  f f  f !  How  he  hurt  my  arm !  I 
should  think  he  must  have  twisted  it  round  and 
round  in  its  socket.  So  you  see,  though  I  am  sorry 
to  seem  ungrateful,  I've  had  all  the  part  I  hate,  all 
the  righting  part,  for  nothing." 

She  smiled  at  him  gaily,  the  lamp  light  from  the 
high  standard  near  at  hand  throwing  golden  gleams 
among  her  soft,  chestnut  hair;  and  then  put  out  a 
slim  hand.  "  Good-bye.  Thanks,  again,  so 
much,"  she  said. 

He  took  it,  and  dropped  it  with  a  curious  re- 
luctance to  let  her  go.  "  You're  sure  you're  not 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC      9 

seriously  hurt?"  he  enquired,  discontentedly,  for 
the  termination  of  the  incident  seemed  rather  flat. 
"  You  are ;  you're  lame,"  he  added,  with  a  certain 
triumph  as  she  took  a  few  steps  forward. 

"  Oh,  that's  nothing,"  answered  the  woman, 
calmly.  "  I  got  hacked  on  the  shin  by  one  of  our 
own  side  in  the  melee.  I  don't  mind  that;  it's  my 
arm  hurts  most.  Luckily  it's  the  left,  so  that  it 
won't  stop  me  working." 

"  But  you've  no  hat,"  he  protested,  as  she  moved 
away  from  him. 

"  I  had  one,  or  rather  a  woollen  cap.  It's  lost  — 
spolia  opima.  It'll  be  put  in  the  Scotland  Yard 
Museum,  no  doubt,  with  a  blood-curdling  inscrip- 
tion. Never  mind,  I've  got  another  at  home." 

"  But  how'll  you  get  home  ?  " 

"  On  a  'bus,"  she  replied,  cheerfully.  "  I  pick 
up  one  at  the  corner  of  Bridge  Street." 

Her  stupidity  irritated  him,  and  he  clicked  his 
tongue.  "  But  on  your  head?  "  he  persisted. 

"  On  my  head  ?  "  said  Mrs.  Evans,  with  her  eye- 
brows up.  "  How  do  you  mean  *  go  home  on  my 
head  '  ?  Is  it  some  new  catch-word  ?  " 

D'Albiac  gave  a  patient  smile  of  disgust.  "  No, 
no.  A  hat;  you  can't  go  home  without  a  hat." 

"  Why  not?  "  she  asked,  wonderingly. 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know.  It  isn't  usual,"  he  said, 
rather  pityingly.  "  Can't  another  be  procured  — 
bought?" 


io     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"At  this  time  of  night?  And  in  Parliament 
Street?"  she  asked,  laughing.  "Besides,  I  don't 
want  another.  It  was  only  an  old  one;  I  expected 
to  lose  it.  I  always  do;  and  make  others  for  the 
purpose  in  my  spare  moments.  Good-night.  I 
must  be  off,  or  I  shall  miss  the  'bus." 

"  May  I  see  you  to  the  corner  ?  "  asked  D'Albiac, 
with  a  sudden  inexplicable  inspiration.  A  moment 
before  he  would  have  ridiculed  the  notion  of  his 
smart,  distinguished  figure,  in  its  waisted  coat, 
gleaming  boots,  and  crush  hat  being  seen  in  con- 
junction with  this  tousled  little  middle-class  person, 
in  so  public  a  spot;  even  though  a  swift  glance  up 
and  down  the  quadruple  line  of  lamps  showed  a 
quiet,  gleaming  and  deserted  street.  Parliament 
Square  still  showed  a  few  scattered  figures,  and  an 
occasional  vehicle  appeared  and  vanished  from  the 
direction  of  the  bridge  or  Victoria  Street. 

"  Oh,  certainly,  if  you're  going  that  way,"  Mrs. 
Evans  agreed,  in  a  friendly  manner;  and  side  by 
side  the  tall,  clean-shaven,  young  man-about-town, 
and  the  slight,  bare-headed  rioter  moved  off  to- 
wards the  square.  Mrs.  Evans'  damaged  leg  made 
their  pace  slow,  and  the  Frenchman  had  a  ridic- 
ulous and  rare  sense  of  constrained  embarrassment 
as  he  adapted  his  walk  to  the  hobble  of  his  com- 
panion, and  beat  his  brains  for  a  subject  of  con- 
versation. Already  he  regretted  his  offer  of  com- 
panionship, and  the  few  hundred  yards  to  the  square 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     n 

seemed  unconscionably  prolonged.  If  he  should 
meet  anyone  he  knew!  If  some  of  the  guests 
from  Whitehall  Place  were  to  drive  by!  Still  it 
was  absurd  to  walk  with  the  woman  in  total 
silence  after  asking,  heaven  knows  why,  for  the 
privilege. 

"  I  see,"  he  resumed,  with  rather  a  fatuous 
laugh,  "  I  should  apologise  for  my  interference." 

She  raised  an  animated  face  towards  him  quickly, 
with  an  expression  of  protest,  and  he  felt  a  sudden 
revival  of  his  drooping  interest.  "  Oh,  don't  think 
I  meant  that.  I  didn't  intend  to  be  ungracious,"  she 
said,  dropping  for  a  moment  her  previous  air  of 
mischievous  amusement. 

"  My  dear  lady,  I'm  only  joking.  And  perhaps 
on  reflection  you'll  be  glad  after  all.  I'm  afraid 
you  wouldn't  like  prison." 

"  I  know  I  should  hate  it.     Still,  it's  worth  it." 

He  shook  his  head  indulgently.  This  was  a 
childish  creature,  although  she  was  not  actually  a 
young  girl.  A  sense  of  the  wisdom  of  immeas- 
urable age,  combined  with  a  renewed  conviction  of 
the  unfitness  of  women  to  appreciate  or  endure  the 
real  facts  of  life  came  over  him.  He  could  almost 
have  patted  her  head,  as  he  reasoned  with  her. 

"  Theoretically  it  is,  perhaps.  Prison  is  a  difficult 
thing  to  realise  until  one  has  been  there.  The 
hideous  monotony,  the  bad,  scanty  food,  the  hard 
bed,  the  squalid,  cheerless  surroundings  — " 


12     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

She  agreed  to  his  statements  with  a  series  of  lit- 
tle nods,  and  he  felt  she  was  impressed. 

"  Where  were  you  ?  Pentonville  ?  "  she  asked 
sympathetically. 

"I?  I?"  he  cried,  outraged.  "You  don't 
think  I've  been  in  prison?  " 

"  You  seemed  to  know  so  much  about  it," 
she  said,  with  raised  eyebrows,  "  and  to  feel  it 
so." 

D'Albiac  was  seriously  annoyed,  particularly  at 
the  suspicion  of  a  dimple  in  the  cheek  of  his  com- 
panion. He  could  not  endure  to  be  mocked;  the 
mere  suspicion  of  it  infuriated  him. 

"  Of  course  I  was  only  speaking  from  hearsay," 
he  said,  coldly,  mastering  an  inclination  to  give  this 
person  a  lesson  in  manners. 

"  Oh !  I  see.  But  as  you  said,  you  know,  one 
can't  realise  it  until  you've  done  it  yourself,  like 
me." 

"You've  —  you've  been  there  already?"  he  en- 
quired, edging  a  little  away  from  her,  as  a  landau- 
lette  flashed  past  them.  It  looked  like  Lady  Cock- 
ington's,  he  reflected  uncomfortably;  true,  it  was 
unlikely  that  she  should  notice  him  walking  with 
this  unpreened  jailbird,  but  the  possibility  of  the 
thing  turned  him  cold. 

"  Twice,"  said  Mrs.  Evans,  in  a  matter-of-fact 
manner,  as  though  speaking  of  "  Elektra  "  or  the 
Horse  Show.  "  Fourteen  days  first  time,  and  then 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     13 

a  month ;  but  I  got  ill,  so  they  turned  me  out  after 
three  weeks." 

An  impulse  of  pity  moved  him  to  draw  nearer 
to  her  and  assume  a  more  friendly  tone.  Clearly 
the  poor  thing  was  intellectually  unsound. 

"And  you're  trying  to  go  back  there  again?" 
he  asked,  gently.  "  Tell  me,  what  in  the  world  do 
you  hope  to  get  by  it  ?  " 

She  looked  up  at  him  with  a  surprised  air. 
"  Oh,  I  thought  you  knew.  Votes,"  she  said, 
smiling  innocently  and  brightly. 

The  man  could  not  help  a  flash  of  laughter  at 
her  impenetrable  density,  although  he  was  aware  it 
sounded  a  trifle  supercilious.  But  it  was  not  to  be 
helped;  and  besides  a  little  practical  derision  might 
do  her  good. 

"  You  take  me  a  little  over  literally,"  he  sug- 
gested, indulgently.  "Of  course  I  realised  your 
object.  What  I  should  have  said  was  that  it  seemed 
to  me  scarcely  the  way  to  attain  it." 

"  Oh,  but  then  you're  not  English,  you  see,"  ex- 
plained Mrs.  Evans,  and  D'Albiac  started  at  the 
words.  Proud  as  he  was  of  his  origin,  he  yet 
had  a  distinct  sense  of  affront.  In  his  intensely 
English  clothes,  with  his  Eton-acquired  English 
speech,  adorned  with  all  the  latest  flowers  of  fash- 
ionable colloquialism,  his  close-shaven  face  and  im- 
perturbable demeanour,  maintained  at  a  great  ex- 
penditure of  will-force,  Henry  D'Albiac  could  not 


14     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

avoid  great  annoyance  at  his  detection  as  a  mere 
visitor  to  the  country;  but  his  companion,  evidently 
unaware  of  the  effect  she  had  produced,  proceeded 
with  her  remarks. 

"Of  course,  I  don't  know  how  it  may  be  in  your 
country,  but  in  ours  one  always  has  to  make  a  row 
to  get  anything  done.  All  English  people  realise 
that.  The  men  had  to  do  it  before  they  freed 
themselves;  only  of  course,  being  more  hys- 
terical than  women,  they  generally  rushed  pretty 
readily  into  real  violence;  whereas  we  don't 
want  to  go  any  further  than  the  other  side 
choose  to  drive  us,  step  by  step.  Shall  we  cross 
here?" 

They  turned  across  the  road  together,  D'Albiac 
looking  at  her  face  in  a  puzzled  manner,  suspecting 
her  seriousness.  It  appeared,  however,  to  be  calm 
and  guileless. 

"  Hysterical  ?     Men  ?  "  he  repeated,  sternly. 

"  Well,  that's  not  a  scientifically  accurate  ex- 
pression; I  know  that,"  she  said,  and  he  was  re- 
volted at  the  woman's  coarseness.  "  Hysterical  in 
the  familiar  use  of  the  word,  you  know.  Excitable ; 
liable  to  lose  self-control." 

They  were  standing  now  at  the  corner  of  Bridge 
Street,  and  she  was  gazing  backwards  up  White- 
hall, waiting  for  the  sight  of  her  omnibus.  Silence 
fell  between  them,  D'Albiac  feeling  that  conversa- 
tion was  not  possible  with  a  person  whose  state- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     15 

ments  consisted  of  entire  inversions  of  matters  of 
fact.  Something  of  his  want  of  sympathy  seemed 
to  communicate  itself  to  Mrs.  Evans,  for  she  turned 
her  face  quickly  towards  him. 

"  Don't  wait  for  me,  please.  I'm  feeling  none 
the  worse  now,  except  for  my  arm  and  the  kick. 
You've  probably  some  way  to  get  home." 

"  No,  I  live  quite  close  here ;  in  Cowley  Street," 
he  said,  politely.  "  I'd  rather  see  you  on  your 
'bus,  if  I  may." 

"  It's  quite  unnecessary,  I  assure  you,"  she  pro- 
tested. "  But  of  course  if  you  prefer  it  — " 

"Have  you  far  to  go,  yourself?"  he  enquired, 
thinking  it  wiser  to  avoid  all  but  the  most  common- 
place remarks. 

"  Only  Chelsea.  My  landlady  will  be  rather  sur- 
prised to  see  me  back  again,  I  expect.  I  told  her  I 
might  be  away  any  time  from  a  fortnight  to  six 
weeks,  with  luck.  However,  there'll  be  plenty 
more  opportunities,  I'm  afraid.  But  it  would  have 
suited  me  pretty  well  now,  because  I've  very  little 
work  in  prospect." 

"  Would  it  be  rude  of  me  to  ask  — "  he  began, 
and  paused.  What  did  it  matter  to  him  what  she 
was,  he  reflected?  Quite  obviously  she  was  not  of 
the  only  avocation  which  would  have  made  a  mem- 
ber of  her  class  in  society  a  possible  associate  at 
any  time  for  himself.  Prone  as  he  was  to  detect 
signs  of  an  amorous  tendency  in  the  females  of  his 


16     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

acquaintance,  he  was  not  able  to  tell  himself  that 
there  were  any,  real  or  potential,  in  the  quaint, 
cool  face  before  him.  And  this  being  so,  why  pro- 
long the  acquaintanceship  longer  than  politeness 
demanded?  Mrs.  Evans,  however,  finished  his 
sentence  for  him. 

"What  I  am?  Not  a  bit.  Why?  I'm  a 
painter,  a  designer.  I  make  decorative  drawings 
for  shops  and  manufacturers ;  all  that  sort  of  thing ; 
piece  work.  Sometimes  —  certain  times  of  year  — 
I  get  a  good  deal  to  do.  Then  I  paint  portraits, 
too,  occasionally;  and  water  colour  and  pastel 
heads.  But  I  can't  rely  on  that;  so  I  have  to  re- 
serve them  as  far  as  possible  for  times  of  bad 
trade.  And  lately  those  have  been  the  times  I've 
chosen  for  prison;  because,  of  course,  when  I've 
lots  of  work  on  hand,  I  can't  afford  to  go.  I've  got 
to  live  somehow.'* 

"  I  see,"  he  said,  sarcastically.  "  You  have 
come  to  regard  Holloway  as  a  holiday  resort." 

"  That's  it,"  she  said,  with  a  gay  laugh.  "  Here's 
my  'bus.  Good-night." 

Before  he  could  reply,  she  had  laid  her  hand  on 
the  rail  of  a  motor  omnibus  that  lumbered  storm- 
ily  by,  and  was  twenty  yards  away  before  he  quite 
•  realised  how  she  had  thus  been  translated.  Star- 
ing blankly,  he  saw  the  slight,  bare-headed  figure, 
clear  against  the  darkness,  in  its  white  jersey,  run 
lightly  up  the  stairway  and  turn  for  a  moment  to 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     17 

wave  a  hand  to  him  as  she  reached  the  roof.  Then 
the  great  vehicle  turned  into  Broad  Sanctuary  and 
in  a  few  seconds  was  out  of  sight. 

D'Albiac  gave  a  short,  rather  scornful  laugh 
aloud,  as  his  last  commentary  on  this  absurd  ad- 
venture and  absurder  person,  and  glad  to  be  re- 
lieved from  the  consequences  of  his  foolish  act, 
strolled  slowly  onward  towards  the  intricate 
congeries  of  streets  in  which  his  tiny  bachelor 
house  was  situated.  In  retrospect,  he  was  more 
than  ever  amazed  at  his  indiscretion.  He  had 
risked  imprisonment,  social  disgrace,  for  the  sake 
of  this  ridiculous  woman  who  was  being  very 
rightly  punished  for  breaking  the  law,  and  was  no 
doubt  receiving  far  more  consideration  than  a 
woman  of  a  poorer  class  would  have  obtained  in 
like  circumstances;  for  the  police  invariably  be- 
haved well  in  these  cases,  as  he  had  often  been  told. 
No  doubt  he  would  not  even  have  been  allowed  the 
alternative  of  being  fined;  for  he  had  literally  as- 
saulted the  constable,  a  thing  which  no  magistrate 
could  be  expected  to  condone.  And  then  the  re- 
ports in  the  newspapers!  The  odious  joy  of  these 
radical  rags  with  their  conscientiously  inverted 
snobbery!  "Young  French  Aristocrat  in  Trouble. 
Popular  Society  Man  Sent  to  Prison  for  Assault.  . 
Suffragette  Beauty  in  Distress."  He  could  see  the 
headlines  in  all  their  blood-chilling  vulgarity;  he 
dimly  fancied  snatches  of  the  tasteless  jocularity 


i8     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

of  the  subsequent  letter  press :  "  Our  impression- 
able visitor  —  with  characteristically  Gallic  chiv- 
alry "  and  all  the  other  sneering  suggestions  of  an 
underlying  reason  for  his  folly;  suggestions  that 
would  inevitably  cause  Patrice  to  sicken  with  a  dis- 
gust from  which  she  would  never  afterwards  be 
able  to  dissociate  him,  even  if  Mrs.  Beaufoy 
(wildly  impossible  hope!)  would  ever  have  con- 
sented to  give  her  daughter  to  a  proven  hooligan  in 
marriage.  And  yet,  he  reflected,  as  he  paused  be- 
fore his  gleaming  green  front-door,  and  drew  out 
his  latch-key,  the  impulse  was  generous,  entirely 
impersonal;  the  result  of  a  mere  glimpse  of  a  weak 
woman  in  the  power  of  superior  physical  force. 
The  dubious  examination  of  his  conscience  con- 
tinued, as  he  shut  the  door  behind  him,  and  stood 
in  his  tiny,  brightly-lit  entrance  hall.  He  was 
sure,  at  least  he  was  almost  sure,  that  he  had  no 
idea,  before  he  took  action,  that  the  woman  was 
anything  beyond  the  proverbial  female  agitator  in 
appearance;  and  yet  he  had  a  vague  feeling  that  it 
was  the  rapid  glimpse  of  a  white,  delicate  face,  with 
closed  eyes  and  piteously  parted  lips  that  had  given 
him  the  actual  stimulus.  The  woman  was  good- 
looking  no  doubt;  there  was  no  harm  in  granting 
that;  not  beautiful  like  his  betrothed;  not  a  girl, 
either.  Still  an  original  and  stimulating  face. 
And  there  was  enough  of  that.  It  was  most  un- 
likely, most  undesirable  that  they  should  ever  meet 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     19 

again;  their  stations  were  widely  separated;  their 
ideas  no  less  widely. 

He  turned  up  the  lights  in  a  small  smoking  room 
that  led  into  the  hall,  and  rang  the  bell  for  his 
servant.  When  the  man  entered  with  the  glasses, 
he  found  his  master  seated  in  a  low  chair,  gazing 
with  vacant  eyes  at  a  picture  over  the  fireplace, 
and  apparently  unconscious  of  the  tray  which  he 
set  at  his  elbow,  with  the  cigar  box  and  spirit  lamp, 
on  a  carved-wood  Indian  stand.  Having  gathered 
up  the  overcoat  and  hat  and  waited  deferentially 
for  a  few  moments,  he  ventured  finally  on  a  gentle 
cough  of  reminder.  D'Albiac  started  and  looked 
at  him  blankly. 

"Eh?  Oh,  yes.  I  think  that's  all.  No  let- 
ters ?  Nobody  telephoned  ?  " 

"  No,  sir." 

D'Albiac  nodded  his  dismissal,  and  as  soon  as 
the  door  was  shut,  rose  hurriedly  from  his  chair. 

"  Fool!  "  he  ejaculated,  angrily;  and  at  the  word 
the  door  re-opened,  and  the  servant's  head  re- 
appeared. 

"Did  you  speak,  sir?"  it  enquired,  softly. 

"  No,  no,  no,  nothing.  That's  all,  Brooks,  that's 
all,"  repeated  his  master,  snapping  an  impatient 
finger  and  thumb.  His  mood  annoyed  him;  the 
memory  of  this  street  brawl,  and  of  the  few  min- 
utes' subsequent  conversation  with  this  vulgarian, 
clung  obstinately  to  him,  despite  his  best  efforts; 


20     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

excluding  from  his  mind  the  delicately  beautiful 
visions  that  he  sought  to  induce.  What  wonder? 
The  whole  squalid  business  was  so  unusual,  so  out 
of  the  common  run  of  his  well-ordered  life  that  the 
impression  was  naturally  a  deep  one. 

Brought  up  at  his  father's  chateau  in  Anjou 
among  a  host  of  family  dependents  and  servants, 
educated  at  first  by  a  series  of  native  and  foreign 
tutors,  despatched  at  fourteen  for  the  perfection 
of  his  English  speech  and  manner  (the  old  Baron 
suffered  from  Anglomania  in  an  acute  form)  to 
Eton  for  four  years,  member  of  a  family  of  the  old 
Nobility,  the  descendant  of  one  who  had  lost  his 
life  on  the  scaffold  during  the  infamous  closing 
years  of  the  eighteenth  century,  Henry  D'Albiac 
had,  during  the  twenty-five  years  of  his  career, 
moved  almost  continually  in  the  highest  and  most 
aristocratic  circles,  whether  on  his  paternal  estates, 
in  the  family  hotel  in  Paris  or,  during  the  winter 
months,  among  the  distinguished  cosmopolitan 
crowd  that  circulated  about  the  villa  at  Cap  Martin. 
It  was  in  that  neighbourhood  that  he  had  first  met 
the  Beaufoys  two  years  ago;  it  was  on  the  shores 
of  that  tediously  blue  sea  that  he  had  entered  into 
the  delightful  slavery  of  Patrice's  beauty  and  al- 
most shuddering  refinement  of  mind.  Within  the 
last  year,  only,  his  father  had  died,  and  finding 
himself  alone  in  the  world  and  freed  from  military 
discipline,  the  young  Frenchman  had  emigrated  to 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     21 

England  in  pursuit  of  his  beloved.     At  the  Beau- 
foys'  house,  in  Mount  Street,  he  had  been  intro- 
duced into  an  exclusive  stratum  of  English  society ; 
the  representatives  of  all  the  family  antiquity,  ter- 
ritorial power,  cultured  leisure,  wealth  and  titular 
nobility  of  a  land  where  these  things  may  be  ad- 
mired in  tropical  abundance  and  size  of  growth. 
Patrice  had  smiled  on  his  suit;  only  a  desire  to 
avoid  the  vulgarity  of  hurry  in  the  matter,  and 
the    necessity    of    allowing    a    decent    interval    of 
mourning    for   his    father's    death    intervened    be- 
tween him  and  the  completion  of  his  happiness. 
Meanwhile,   handsome,   rich,   young  and   sociable, 
he  found  life  in  this  great,  ugly,  luxurious  town  ex- 
tremely agreeable,  and  the  number  and  urgency  of 
his  social  engagements  made  it  a  matter  of  con- 
gratulation to  him  that  he  had  no  other  occupations 
in  the  world  to  divert  his  mind  from  their  proper 
discharge.      Later    perhaps,    he    reflected,    as    he 
scrutinized  his   face  in  the  glass  over  the  chim- 
ney-piece, he  would  go  into  politics,  either  in  his 
own    or   his    adopted    country,    as    Patrice    chose. 
There  was   much  to  be   done,  Heaven  knows,  in 
either   land   to    stem   this   raging   flood    of   gross 
avarice,    atheism,    licence    and    class-hatred    that 
threatened  to  overthrow  all  that  was  beautiful,  hal- 
lowed and  desirable  in  society.     The  countenance 
that  looked  back  at  him  gave,  he  allowed  himself  to 
think,  promise  of  gifts  that  would  carry  him  far. 


22     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

It  was  indeed  an  interesting,  emotional  and  en- 
thusiastic face,  though  its  greediness  of  life  had 
been  modified  by  the  discipline  of  society  to  a  fair 
imitation  of  the  correct  apathy  of  demeanour;  and 
the  originality  of  its  lines  certainly  justified  his  be- 
lief that,  when  it  became  desirable,  he  was  capable 
of  serious  work.  Meanwhile  he  was  young,  and 
life  was  a  highly  amusing  thing,  for  all  the  absurd 
strictures  which  the  pessimists  heaped  upon  it. 
There  was  love  and  sport,  open  to  all,  or  practically 
all;  what  more  did  they  ask?  And,  among  the 
lesser  joys,  social  intercourse,  wine,  music,  and  the 
other  arts.  He  hummed  an  operatic  phrase  dear  to 
his  betrothed,  "  Vissi  d'arte,  vissi  d'amore,"  and 
cast  an  eye  of  perhaps  rather  perfunctory  admira- 
tion at  the  reproduction  of  Watts'  "  Hope  "  and 
"  Love  and  Life,"  which,  as  two  of  her  favourite 
pictures,  decorated  the  walls  of  the  cosy  little  room. 

Truly,  a  street-fight,  the  rescue  of  a  released  con- 
vict, and  the  subsequent  absurd  association  with 
such  a  person  were  odd  enough  incidents  to  dis- 
turb his  equilibrium  and  require  a  certain  lapse  of 
time  to  complete  their  effacement,  and  to  allow  his 
mind  to  return  into  its  normal  and  desired  chan- 
nels. 

He  lit  a  cigar  and  mixed  a  little  weak  whiskey 
and  soda  water,  a  beverage  for  which  he  was  la- 
boriously overcoming  a  strong  natural  repugnance, 
and  sat  again  in  the  deep  chair,  to  think  over  the 
earlier  events  of  the  evening  and  look  forward  with 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     23 

rapturous  anticipation  to  his  next  meeting  with 
Patrice.  To-night  they  had  only  encountered  at  a 
friend's  house,  and  had  not  even  sat  together  at 
table.  But  how  beautiful  she  had  been  in  the  soft 
diffused  light,  half -hidden  from  him  at  times  by 
the  great  bunches  of  pink  roses  that  decked  the 
table;  her  head  drooping  with  that  weary  grace 
and  intolerance  of  the  commonplaces  of  life 
that  became  her  so  well;  her  red  lips  curled  into 
that  adorably  scornful  expression  that  so  bewitched 
him !  Her  rare  words  to  her  loquacious  neighbour 
—  that  fellow  Forbes !  —  reached  him  from  time 
to  time,  in  all  the  long-drawn,  honeyed  sweetness 
of  her  soft,  tired  voice.  Under  the  memory  of  the 
gracious  vision,  his  mind  rapidly  resumed  its  pos- 
ture of  habitual  adoration;  and  though  now  and 
again  another  face,  wide-eyed,  alert  and  boyish,  in- 
truded between  his  mind's  eye  and  the  adored 
features,  and  another  voice,  soft  too,  but  rapid,  un- 
necessarily friendly  and  oddly  alive,  clashed  with 
the  weary  music  of  the  voice  he  loved,  yet  the  in- 
terruptions became  fewer  and  more  widely  sep- 
arated as  he  sat  idly  on  into  the  night;  until  at 
last  he  could  smile  contemptuously  at  the  vagaries 
of  the  masculine  mind  that  could  allow  even  mo- 
mentarily the  possibility  of  competition  between 
two  beings  so  physically  and  spiritually  remote 
from  each  other;  and  it  was  an  unblurred,  undese- 
crated  image  of  his  beautiful  lover  that  he  took 
with  him  to  his  pillow. 


II 

A  WEEK  or  two  later,  on  a  fine  Friday  towards 
the  latter  end  of  June,  Henry  D'Albiac  rang  at  the 
door  of  one  of  the  big  red-brick  houses  in  Mount 
Street,  the  London  abode  of  his  future  mother-in- 
law,  the  long-widowed  Mrs.  Beaufoy.  The  Beau- 
foys,  during  Patrice's  childhood,  had  principally 
lived  on  their  family  estate  in  Wiltshire  and,  dur- 
ing part  of  the  winter,  at  the  villa  near  Cimiez; 
nor  was  it  until  it  became  advisable  to  consider  the 
matrimonial  future  of  her  younger  child  that  Mrs. 
Beaufoy  had  thought  it  necessary  to  add  a  London 
house  to  her  other  troublesome  luxuries.  Evidence 
of  the  good  taste  of  the  daughter  was  shown, 
D'Albiac  reflected  as  he  waited  for  admission,  in 
the  choice  of  this  home  in  preference  to  one  of  the 
available  buildings  of  dingy,  aristocratic  ugliness 
that  she  might  have  had,  if  she  wished,  in  some  yet 
more  fashionable  spot;  the  house  was  agreeable  in 
colour  and  style;  there  was  a  good  deal  of  orna- 
mental ironwork  of  a  rather  debased  design,  and 
before  the  leaded  window  panes  on  each  floor  well- 
filled  flower-boxes  flamed  and  fluttered  in  the  sun- 
light and  breeze  of  the  summer  day. 

D'Albiac,  who  was  always  late  for  everything, 
obedient  to  a  fashionable  law  which,  as  he  hardly 

24 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     25 

realised,  was  falling  into  desuetude,  was  true  on 
this  occasion  to  his  record;  and  after  laying  aside 
his  hat,  gloves,  and  cane,  was  shown  into  the  dining- 
room,  where  a  small  party  were  seated  at  table. 
His  arrival  was  greeted  with  a  piercing  cry  from  a 
sandy-haired,  ruddy,  moustached  man,  who  was 
seated  next  to  Patrice  Beaufoy. 

"  Hooray !     Top-hole !     Here's  old  Jools !  " 

The  uproariousness  of  the  salutation  caused  Miss 
Beaufoy  to  shut  her  long,  dark  eyes  quickly,  with 
an  agonised  intake  of  the  breath,  while  her  mother, 
who  had  the  nerves  that  were  fashionable  in  the 
previous  generation,  contented  herself  with  a  fatly- 
smiling  reproof. 

"  Roddy !  Really !  Henry,  how  late  you  are ! 
Come  and  sit  here  by  me." 

D'Albiac  took  the  chair  towards  which  she 
waved  her  plump  little  hand,  between  herself  and 
her  daughter,  and  after  a  murmured  apology  to  his 
hostess  and  the  one  word  "  Patrice ! "  uttered  in  a 
thrilling  undertone  to  his  betrothed,  began  looking 
round  the  table  and  bowing  or  nodding  (the  differ- 
ence being,  in  the  British  manner,  not  very  marked) 
to  the  few  guests,  all  of  whom  were  personally 
known  to  him. 

From  the  opposite  side,  on  Mrs.  Beaufoy's  right 
hand,  Mr.  Colman  gave  him  a  death's-head  smile. 
This  was  a  tall,  fleshless  person,  with  large  feet,  an 
ill-filled,  cadaverous  skin,  and  a  clipped  black 


26     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

moustache.  He  was  connected  by  various  collat- 
eral bonds  with  the  Peerage,  and  was  entirely 
harmless  and  unmalicious;  and  these  were,  nat- 
urally enough,  sufficient  qualifications  to  explain  his 
continual  presence  at  all  the  fashionable  houses  in 
London.  He  had,  however,  practically  no  con- 
versation, although  he  was  extremely  talkative,  and, 
perhaps  to  atone  for  this  disability,  affected  the 
manner  of  a  spoilt  school-girl,  which  accorded  only 
moderately  well  with  his  elderly  and  undecorative 
appearance.  He  appeared  to  have  no  personal 
tastes  beyond  sitting  about  in  old  ladies'  drawing- 
rooms;  generally  in  the  tortive  attitude  of  the  Man 
of  Sorrows  in  the  frontispiece  to  Diirer's  "  Great 
Passion " ;  and  when  routed  from  these  hills  of 
Beulah  would  take  refuge  in  the  reading-room  of 
the  St.  James'  Club,  where  he  might  be  seen  study- 
ing the  democratically  alternated  photographs  of 
burlesque  actresses  and  fashionable  society  beauties, 
with  or  without  their  attendance  of  charmingly 
unaffected  children,  in  the  pages  of  the  illustrated 
weekly  papers.  It  was  rumoured  that  Mr.  Col- 
man  had  in  his  youth  passed  through  a  brief  and 
unrecognised  career  as  a  diplomatist;  but  no  man 
had  ever  seen  him,  since  those  days,  engaged  in  any 
occupation.  His  elderly  patronesses  referred  to 
him  habitually  as  a  good,  kind  creature,  in  tones 
denoting  a  certain  tolerance.  Turning  his  face 
from  D'Albiac,  he  addressed  a  remark  in  his  loud, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     27 

toneless  voice  to  his  neighbour,  Mrs.  Fedden,  a  de- 
lightfully innocent-looking  person,  of  colonial  ante- 
cedents, with  a  retiring  husband  and  apparently 
generous  means,  who  had  entered  the  circles  in 
which  she  now  moved  since  the  day  when  she  em- 
braced the  Roman  Catholic  religion;  a  conver- 
sion which  had  caused  many  of  the  more  distin- 
guished Catholic  families,  and  among  them  that  of 
Mrs.  Beaufoy,  to  awake  to  her  existence  and  the 
charms  of  her  personality.  With  her  continual 
bright  smile,  even  white  teeth  and  brilliant  colour- 
ing, she  was  decoratively  most  engaging,  and  she 
had  no  opinions  which  could  possibly  offend  any- 
body. 

At  the  bottom  of  the  table,  fat  young  Ivan  Beau- 
foy, the  son  of  the  house,  ate  stolidly  and  drank 
persistently.  He  held  a  commission  in  the  Royal 
Horse  Guards,  but  beyond  that  distinction,  admit- 
tedly a  great  one,  there  was  nothing  much  to  be 
said  about  him,  except  that  he  was  miraculously 
long  in  shedding  his  cubbishness,  which  growled 
and  peeped  rebelliously  from  behind  the  disguise 
of  his  curled  moustache,  stayed  figure  and  expensive 
clothes. 

Roderick  Chalmers  was  a  more  interesting  per- 
sonality, and  might  indeed  be  described  as  the  lion 
of  the  gathering.  Roddy,  as  even  complete  and 
conventional  strangers  found  themselves  calling 
him  after  the  briefest  acquaintance,  was  regarded 


28     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

in  his  own  circle  as  a  brilliant  eccentric;  he  had 
written  a  real  play,  which  had  been  produced  at  a 
real  theatre  by  no  less  a  person  than  Travers  Carr 
himself,  generally  admitted  to  be  the  chief est  orna- 
ment of  our  own  and  consequently  all  other  con- 
temporary stages;  and  as  all  the  dramatis  persona 
had  been  impressed  among  the  author's  own  friends 
and  arrayed  in  the  most  diaphanous  disguises,  and 
as  also  the  dialogue  was  informed  with  a  kind  of 
imbecile  high  spirits,  the  piece  had  had  quite  a  lit- 
tle run,  and  Roddy  had  acquired  a  reputation  as  a 
wit  that  no  amount  of  subsequent  absurdity  of 
behaviour  was  able  to  affect.  Carr,  who  aspired  to 
join  the  circle  in  which  Roddy  principally  moved, 
had  mounted  the  comedy  with  great  pomp,  and  had 
taken  care  to  bring  out  its  chief  attraction,  by 
"  making  up  "  the  members  of  his  company  in  such 
manner  that  only  the  very  dullest  movers  in  society 
could  fail  to  recognise  their  prototypes;  his  own 
countenance  being  so  elaborately  built  and  painted 
in  imitation  of  the  features  of  a  distinguished 
political  peer  that  the  possibility  of  any  facial  play 
was  wholly  removed,  and  even  speech  became  a 
matter  demanding  the  greatest  circumspection.  The 
manager's  laudable  ambition  to  rise  in  the  social 
scale  was,  however,  frustrated  by  the  inconvenient 
fact  that  Roddy  had  at  least  a  dozen  different 
strata  of  acquaintanceship,  which  he  knew  better 
than  to  spoil  by  commixture.  Everybody  knew 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     29 

Roddy,  and  Roddy  knew  and  enjoyed  everybody. 
There  was  quite  a  competition  in  the  "  Season  "  for 
his  company;  but  he  was  the  most  untrustworthy 
guest  in  the  world,  for  although  he  accepted  every 
invitation  with  manifestly  good  intentions  and  ex- 
pressions of  unfeigned  delight,  he  found,  naturally 
enough,  that  it  was  not  easy  to  dine  at  half-a- 
dozen  houses  on  the  same  evening;  and  generally 
solved  the  difficulty,  when  it  arose  and  he  had  no 
particular  preference  for  any  one  invitation,  by 
eluding  all  his  engagements  under  cover  of  a  cloud 
of  mendacious  telegrams,  and  seeking  out  amuse- 
ment for  himself  in  some  of  the  less  conventional 
quarters  that  he  affected ;  for  he  knew  the  most  ap- 
palling people ;  strange  objects  in  baggy  tweed  suits 
and  flannel  shirts;  mop-headed  women  without  any 
pretentions  to  smartness;  long-haired,  pallid  for- 
eigners; hosts  of  unknown  actors  and  artists;  and, 
on  one  occasion,  had  been  actually  met  in  Bond 
Street  arm-in-arm  with  a  most  notorious  anarch, 
slouch  hat,  tangled  beard  and  all,  whom,  he  subse- 
quently persisted,  he  had  picked  up  at  the  Bomb 
Club  in  Hackney  Wick.  Actually  he  would  have 
introduced  this  lunatic  to  the  horrified  narrator  of 
the  incident  had  the  latter  not,  with  admirable  pres- 
ence of  mind,  dived  incontinently  into  Douglas's, 
and  submitted  a  smarting  skin  to  a  wholly  un- 
necessary shave.  Not  that  Roddy  Chalmers  be- 
lieved in  anarchy;  indeed  it  would  be  difficult  to 


30     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

suppose  he  believed  in  anything;  his  demeanour  in 
all  circumstances  being  one  of  ecstatic  amusement, 
which  manifested  itself  in  agonies  of  laughter, 
often  for  causes  that  would  hardly  have  affected 
the  gravity  of  a  village  idiot.  But  "  all  those  sort 
of  people/'  he  protested,  "  were  such  frightful  fun." 
Their  absurd  enthusiasms  afforded  him  food  for 
endless  mirth,  besides  furnishing  him  with  topics 
of  conversation  for  subsequent  dinner  tables.  On 
the  whole,  except  with  certain  highly  sensitive  per- 
sons, of  whom  Patrice  Beaufoy  was  one,  he  was  re- 
garded with  affection  by  all  his  acquaintances,  in 
spite  of  his  habitual  irreverence  and  the  social  com- 
plications caused  by  that  hopeless  sketchiness  of 
mind,  which  was  revealed  in  his  wild,  absent- 
minded  eyes,  that  seldom  rested  on  those  to  whom 
he  spoke. 

Patrice  herself  completed  the  present  party;  a 
truly  lovely  creature;  no  such  dark,  downcast  eyes, 
gorgeous  red  hair,  pouting  lips  and  clear  pallor 
were  ever  seen  outside  a  portrait  by  Rossetti.  It 
was  not  necessary  for  her  to  speak  —  indeed  she 
seldom  did  —  for  all  to  realise  the  exquisite  re- 
finement of  the  soul  that  had  so  wonderful  a  dwell- 
ing. Patrice  lived  in  a  world  of  beauty  that  she 
had  made  for  herself ;  a  realm  that  no  mere  Philis- 
tine dare  criticise;  peopled  with  the  figures  of 
Burne-Jones'  art  moving  through  Fragonard  land- 
scapes to  the  sound  of  Debussy's  music. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     31 

Although  Henry  D'Albiac  had  been  her  friend 
for  a  year  and  more,  her  betrothed  for  some 
months,  he  realised  that  he  had  not  yet  plumbed 
the  violet-clouded  depths  of  that  passionately 
shrinking  nature.  It  was  so  easy  to  fall  for  a  mo- 
ment into  the  ugly,  the  commonplace,  the  violent 
in  conversation ;  to  refer  to  some  of  the  unpleasant, 
contentious  subjects  that  were  daily  thrust  before 
one's  eyes  and  hoarsely  shouted  in  one's  ears;  and 
at  the  mere  suggestion  of  the  brutal  and  painful 
Patrice's  eyes  would  close,  and  her  slow,  rare 
words  falter  and  die.  "Must  we  talk  of  that?" 
was  one  of  her  favourite  and  most  pathetic  en- 
quiries. Her  gentle  heart  and  delicate  mind  re- 
coiled instinctively  from  the  knowledge  of  such 
things ;  there  were  other,  harder,  coarser  natures  to 
do  the  work  of  the  world;  there  were  people  who 
seemed  actually  to  enjoy  the  battlefield  and  the  hos- 
pital and  the  police  court;  or  who  exulted  in  haul- 
ing up  from  their  dismal  depths  the  unavoidable 
carrion  of  crime,  poverty  and  ignorance,  and  ex- 
pecting more  sensitive  persons  to  enjoy  the  spec- 
tacle. With  Patrice,  Henry  was  always  in  fairy- 
land; whether  side  by  side  with  her  in  her  opera 
box  he  partook,  with  his  beloved,  of  the  charm- 
ingly restrained  sorrows  of  Rodolfo  and  Mimi;  or 
walked  at  sunset  with  her  beneath  the  trim  hedges 
of  her  own  rose  garden,  silent  and  happy,  content 
at  times  to  touch  her  warm,  white  hand  with  his 


32     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

own;  or,  seated  at  her  feet  in  the  dimly  illumi- 
nated and  consequently  rather  perilous  drawing- 
room  in  Mount  Street,  on  such  extremely  rare 
evenings  as  there  were  no  other  guests,  recited  to 
her  in  the  rosy  light,  with  elaborate  explanations, 
the  sonnets  of  Heredia,  which,  in  consequence  of 
the  recommendation  of  a  cultured  friend,  he  was 
conscientiously  studying;  rewarded  by  an  occa- 
sional nod  of  comprehension,  or  a  partly  articulated 
word  of  joy  at  some  austerely  sonorous  line.  This 
was  indeed  the  ideal  companion,  he  often  reflected, 
for  a  man  to  have,  a  refuge  from  all  the  toil  and 
fighting  of  the  world  to  which  men,  even  young 
men  of  the  wealthier  classes,  are  necessarily  at 
times  exposed;  an  enchanted  country  to  which  one 
could  fly  at  a  moment's  notice  — "  Paradise  always 
on  tap,"  that  idiot  Roddy  had  once  said  with  his 
usual  coarseness,  and  yet  with  some  conception  of 
the  idea,  too. 

There  was  a  pause  after  D'Albiac's  entrance,  dur- 
ing which  fat,  pachydermatous  Mrs.  Beaufoy  gave 
some  secret  injunctions  to  the  butler,  and  Patrice 
took  the  occasion  to  murmur  to  her  lover,  raising 
on  him  for  one  moment  her  beautiful  dark  eyes: 
"  I  read  the  little  book  you  sent  me." 
"  Did  you  find  it  all  I  told  you  ?  "  he  answered 
in  his  warm,  deep  voice,  that  contrasted  so  oddly 
with  the  usual  loud  quackings  of  his  English  men 
friends. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     33 

She  paused  with  an  air  of  pretty  deliberation, 
characteristic  of  her. 

"  I  think  so.  And  yet  —  perhaps  I  don't  quite 
appreciate  it  yet.  Is  that  silly  of  me?  Perhaps 
there  is  more  behind  what  sometimes  seems  to  me 
at  first  so  —  so  slight,  I  was  going  to  say  ?  Is  that 
an  impertinence  ?  " 

"  Tell  me  all  you  really  think,"  he  pressed  her, 
enraptured  at  the  sweet  deference  of  the  words  that 
lingered  lovingly  on  the  pouting  lips,  as  if  unwilling 
to  leave  so  lovely  a  habitation. 

"  No,  I  daren't,"  she  said  almost  inaudibly,  with 
a  little  shake  of  her  gleaming  head.  "  I  must  read 
it  again  —  many  times.  And  then  —  You  musn't 
think  I  don't  like  it  now,"  she  broke  off  with  a  little 
air  of  penitence  and  a  glimpse  of  the  velvet  eyes. 
"  Much  of  it  struck  me  as  quite  beautiful.  What 
does  it  say? 

"'  Le  gentil  rossignolet 

Nouvelet  — ' " 

How  charming  her  English  accent  was  in  the 
familiar  French  words!  thought  her  lover  enthusi- 
astically (an  opinion  by  the  way,  which  would 
hardly  have  gratified  Miss  Beaufoy  herself),  as  he 
took  up  the  verse: 

"' Avecques  sa  bien-aimee 
Pour — '" 


34 

"Pour  vingt  minutes  d'arret!  Par  ma  foie 
grasl "  broke  in  Roddy,  with  a  shriek  of  laughter. 
"  Mrs  Beaufoy,  do  stop  'em.  It  isn't  fair  to  let  'em 
make  love  in  unknown  tongues  in  public.  Now  I 
shan't  get  another  syllable  out  of  Miss1  Beaufoy 
all  lunch  time,  and  young  Ivan  here's  much  too 
busy  eating  to  say  anything." 

Patrice  dropped  her  eyes  with  a  patient  shrug 
of  her  plump  shoulders ;  while  her  brother,  who  was 
of  a  stolid  and  rather  captious  disposition,  jerked 
out  in  a  growl: 

"  Haven't  eaten  any  more  than  you." 

"  I  know''  agreed  Roddy,  with  a  piercing  scream, 
"  but  I've  had  far  too  much  lunch ;  I  always  do 
when  I'm  asked  here  on  a  Friday.  Mrs.  Beaufoy, 
I  think  seriously  of  coming  over  to  Rome  —  is 
that  the  right  way  to  put  it  ?  You  know  it's  such  a 
sound  idea  to  have  one  day  a  week  when  your 
cook  has  to  invent  all  sorts  of  jolly  tempting  things 
to  eat,  and  cutlets  are  barred.  I've  eaten  cutlets 
every  day  this  last  fortnight  for  lunch,  I  swear 
I  have." 

Mrs.  Beaufoy,  conscious  of  being  no  ascetic,  was 
a  little  affronted  at  this  vulgar  method  of  consider- 
ing fast  days,  but  Chalmers  gave  her  no  time  to 
protest  or  explain. 

"  So  you  shouldn't  be  late  on  a  Friday,  Jools," 
he  added  earnestly.  "  We've  finished  everything  up." 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     35 

"  Except  the  sweeties,"  said  Mr.  Colman,  help- 
ing himself  to  chocolates  from  a  silver  bonbonniere, 
and  offering  it  to  his  neighbour.  "  I  love  sweeties, 
don't  you,  Mrs.  Fedden?  Oh,  please  say  you  do! 
It  will  be  quite  horrid  of  you  to  make  me  the 
only  baby  of  the  party." 

Mrs.  Fedden  gave  him  the  required  assurance 
with  an  indescribable  brightness,  as  with  his  head 
on  one  side  he  pressed  the  dainties  upon  her  with 
a  maidenly  pout. 

D'Albiac  helped  himself  to  a  freshly  made  ome- 
lette with  a  feeling  of  annoyance.  It  was  impos- 
sible to  get  a  word  with  Patrice  among  so  small  a 
party,  particularly  when  it  included  that  fool  Chal- 
mers. 

"  Shall  I  see  something  of  you  alone  this  after- 
noon?" he  murmured,  in  an  undertone. 

"  I'm  afraid  not.  We're  engaged  for  something, 
I  forget  what.  Mama*"  she  continued,  turning  to 
her  mother  with  her  pretty  air  of  petulance,  "  what 
were  we  to  do  to-day?" 

"  Don't  you  remember,  darling  ?  We  promised 
to  go  to  a  meeting  at  Lady  Midhurst's  in  Queen 
Anne's  Gate." 

"  Dear  Lady  Midhurst !  "  cried  Colman  in  a  rap- 
ture. "  I  was  at  her  house  only  yesterday,  and 
found  Father  Morgan  there.  Isn't  he  charming? 
Do  say  you  love  him!  So  cheerful  and  uplifting. 


36     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

You  can  hear  '  Sursum  cor  da '  in  every  note  of  his 
dear  old  voice,  can't  you  ?  " 

"  Well,  and  why  not?  "  asked  Roddy  hilariously. 
"  Old  Morgan's  no  bad  judge,  and  no  wonder  he's 
cheerful.  Lady  Midhurst's  an  uncommon  pretty 
woman." 

"  My  dear  Roddy ! "  said  Mrs.  Beauf oy,  with 
a  serious  elongation  of  her  upper  lip. 

"  Jolly  good  egg  being  a  priest ;  I've  always 
thought  that,"  persisted  Roddy,  in  convulsions  of 
mirth.  "  Lots  of  confidence  and  sympathy,  and 
that.  Of  course,  I'm  only  ragging,"  he  concluded 
with  a  poor  pretence  at  gravity,  as  his  wandering 
eye  caught  for  an  instant  the  expression  of  dis- 
gust with  which  Patrice  was  regarding  him. 

"  Oh,  Roddy !  Oh,  fie !  You  bad  fellow !  "  said 
Mr.  Colman,  shaking  a  knotty  finger  at  him,  in 
mock  indignation.  "  Isn't  he  a  dreadful  person, 
dear  Mrs.  Beauf  oy?" 

"  Hopeless,"  replied  the  hostess,  in  her  slow,  unc- 
tuous tones.  "  You  shan't  lunch  here  again,  if 
you're  not  good,  Roddy.  Yes,  I'm  sorry  we  can't 
take  you  with  us  very  well,  Henry,"  she  explained. 
"  But  you  wouldn't  like  it ;  there  won't  be  any  men 
there,  and  hardly  any  girls,  I  expect;  chiefly  a  lot 
of  us  old  women." 

"  Just  the  place  for  old  Colman,"  said  Roddy 
audibly  to  Ivan,  who  grunted  discouragingly. 

"Lady  Midhurst  is  organising  a  branch  society 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     37 

to  resist  this  Woman's  Suffrage  absurdity,  and  I 
promised  to  help  her." 

D'Albiac  looked  in  surprise  at  his   sweetheart. 

"Are  you  interested  in  that  subject?  "  he  asked, 
with  lifted  eyebrows. 

She  shut  her  eyes,  and  shook  her  head  slowly 
with  a  pout. 

"  Oh,  no.  But  maman  wants  me  to  go  with  her, 
and  sign  my  name  to  something.  What  does  it 
matter?  The  whole  subject  is  ugly  and  stupid.  It's 
not  worth  while  refusing." 

"  I  wish  you  would  take  an  interest  in  it,  darling ; 
can't  you  make  her,  Henry?  At  first  it  was  only 
stupid  and  ugly,  as  Patrice  says,  but  it's  becom- 
ing dangerous.  Some  quite  good  people  have 
joined  the  other  side  —  good  names,  I  mean.  I 
can't  think  what  they're  thinking  of.  And  it's  our 
duty  to  stop  it  before  it  gets  too  far." 

D'Albiac  shifted  uneasily  in  his  chair.  It  was 
plain  that  Mrs.  Beaufoy  took  a  serious  view  of  the 
matter;  and  though  he  had  no  sympathy  one  way 
or  the  other,  he  had  a  guilty  memory  of  a  half- 
forgotten  incident,  and  a  glimpse  of  a  white  face 
standing  out  in  the  pale  lamplight  against  a  black 
background  of  struggling  forms. 

"  Yes,  I  see,"  he  admitted,  slowly.  "  I  suppose 
there's  no  doubt  it  would  be  a  bad  thing  —  " 

He  broke  off  as  the  footman  offered  him  some 
Sole  Normande;  while  Mrs.  Beaufoy  surveyed  him 


38     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

with  a  displeased  steadiness  in  her  half-closed, 
twinkling  eyes. 

"  You  don't  mean  to  tell  us  you're  a  Suffra- 
gist?" she  asked. 

He  brushed  the  question  aside  with  a  wave  of  the 
hand  and  a  smile  of  genuine;  amusement. 

"  I  hope  not,"  she  said,  drily.  "  I  shouldn't  like 
to  think  you  had  anything  to  say  for  these  dread- 
ful, shrieking  creatures  who  are  responsible  for  it 
all.  How  any  woman,  unless  she's  tipsy,  can  be- 
have like  that,  I  don't  know." 

Mr.  Colman  sighed  sympathetically  over  a  glass 
of  Madeira. 

"  Such  dreadful  clothes  they  wear,  too !  "  he  pro- 
tested in  confirmation  of  the  ridiculousness  of  the 
cause.  "  Boat  hats  and  great  boots !  " 

At  the  mere  suggestion  of  these  monstrosities  of 
garb  Mrs.  Fedden  gave  a  little  squeak  of  amused 
horror  and  added  her  own  indictment. 

"  And  they're  all  so  hideous  themselves !  " 

"Oh!  Are  they  though?"  interrupted  Roddy, 
in  tumultuous  merriment.  "  I  know  better,  Mrs. 
Fedden.  Some  of  'em  are  jolly  good-looking 
women." 

"  What  nonsense !  "  said  his  hostess,  calmly,  dust- 
ing some  powdered  ginger  over  a  slice  of  melon. 
"  What  nonsense,  Roddy !  You  don't  know  any- 
thing about  it ! " 

"  I  bet  I  do,'"  cried  Roddy,  unabashed  by  this 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     39 

contradiction.  "  Why,  I  met  a  lot  of  'em  last 
winter  at  Violet  Verney's  house  —  Robert's  sister, 
you  know." 

"  Poor  Robert  Verney !  "  said  Mrs.  Beaufoy,  pity- 
ingly. "  Yes,  that's  a  cheese  souffle,  Henry ;  won't 
you  have  some  trifle  first?  Poor  Robert  Verney! 
I  really  think  that  unfortunate  sister  of  his  must 
be  going  out  of  her  mind.  And  you're  not  going 
to  tell  us  that  you  think  she  has  any  looks,  Roddy?  " 

"  Oh !  I  don't  say  she  has,"  said  Roddy,  buoy- 
antly. "  Though  she's  a  thundering  nice  woman, 
if  she  is  a  bit  cracked.  But  lots  of  'em  are  nice- 
looking,  I  give  you  my  word." 

Patrice  laughed  without  smiling;  Mrs.  Fedden 
uttered  a  sparkling  ejaculation  of  incredulity;  and 
Mr.  Colman  writhed  in  almost  horrible  enjoyment 
of  this  absurd  fellow's  joke. 

"  They  are,  Miss  Beaufoy,  really,"  Roddy  con- 
tinued, turning  to  what  he  felt  was  the  most  sym- 
pathetic quarter.  "  I  tell  you  I  know  some  of  'em 
well;  and  others  I've  seen  lots  of  times;  and  quite 
a  lot  of  the  well-known  ones  would  be  thought 
pretty  women  anywhere." 

He  cited  a  notoriously  fascinating  leader  in  the 
movement,  and  added  other  instances. 

"  And  then  there's  Mrs.  Warlingham,  who  cut 
off  the  lights  at  the  big  meeting  at  Middlesbrough. 
And  Flora  Evans,  who  jolly  nearly  died  in  prison 
—  and  she's  quite  a  friend  of  mine.  And  that  little 


40     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

girl  —  what's  her  name  —  who  looks  like  the  fairy 
off  a  Christmas  tree  —  the  one  who  got  knocked 
out  with  the  fire-hose  at  Worcester?  And  Mrs. 
Stafford  —  she  dresses  awfully  well,  too.  And 
Hilda  Sellars  —  " 

Mrs.  Beaufoy  raised  plump  white  hands  of  pro- 
test at  his  volubility. 

"  Oh !  My  dear  Roddy,  have  it  your  own  way. 
But  whether  they're  pretty  or  ugly,  I'd  have  them 
all  whipped  through  the  streets." 

"  Oh,  I  say!  "  cried  Roddy,  prodigiously  amused, 
and  winking  delightedly  at  D'Albiac,  whose  eye  he 
caught  resting  on  him  with  an  air  of  newly-awak- 
ened interest. 

"  I  would,"  insisted  Mrs.  Beaufoy,  quite  flushed 
with  her  zeal  for  this  act  of  public  service.  "  At 
the  cart's  tail." 

"  Does  that  make  it  hurt  more  ?  "  enquired  Roddy, 
with  interest.  "  D'you  know?  I  never  knew  a 
cart  had  one." 

"  There's  nothing  to  laugh  at,"  said  the  elderly 
lady,  evidently  really  annoyed  at  his  frivolity. 
"  Disgraceful  creatures,  dragging  the  decency  of 
their  own  sex  in  the  mud.  If  they're  friends  of 
yours,  I  can't  help  it;  I'm  sorry  to  say  that's  what 
I  think  of  them." 

"  Oh,  I  don't  mind  a  bit,"  Roddy  admitted,  with 
unmoved  equanimity,  staring  vaguely  about  the 
room.  "  Of  course,  it's  all  rot,  this  suffrage  busi- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     41 

ness.  But  that  makes  'em  so  much  more  jolly 
funny,  don't  you  think?  They  really  believe  it's 
quite  a  serious  matter,  and  they  talk  till  all's  blue 
about  it.  Well,  I  tell  you,  it  tickles  me  so,  that 
I've  rather  kept  up  some  of  'em  on  purpose,  so 
that  if  ever  I'm  feeling  a  bit  down  on  my  luck  —  " 

"You!"  objected  Colman,  shrilly.  "Roddy 
down  on  his  luck!  Oh,  no!  Oh,  can  you  see  it, 
Miss  Beaufoy?  Oh,  capital!" 

Patrice's  upper  lip  lifted  for  a  conventional, 
unamused  smile;  clearly  she  thought  such  a  state 
of  mind  on  Chalmers'  part  would  afford  rather  a 
pleasant  relief  to  his  associates. 

"  I  do  sometimes,  Colman.  You  don't  know  the 
reactions  we  thinking  fellows  suffer  from.  Try 
thinking  some  day,  and  you'll  find  out.  Well,  when 
I'm  like  that,  I  can  always  depend  on  some  of  these 
Suffragettes  to  buck  me  up.  They  keep  me  in  fits ; 
and  they're  most  of  'em  awf'ly  good  tempered  about 
it,  I  must  say." 

"  I'm  glad  to  think  you  can  find  it  an  amusing 
subject.  Some  people  I  know  can  extract  enter- 
tainment from  anything,  however  wicked  or  sad," 
pronounced  Mrs.  Beaufoy,  severely. 

"  Oh,  well,  there !  Now  I'm  flattened  out. 
That  was  really  a  nasty  one,  Mrs.  Beaufoy,"  re- 
plied the  impenitent  scoffer,  calmly.  "  I  won't  say 
another  word,  until  you  tell  me  I  may." 

The  ruffled  lady,  conscious  that  she  had  a  little 


42     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

exceeded  the  privileges  of  age  and  friendship,  shook 
her  head  humorously  at  him,  to  mitigate  the  sever- 
ity of  her  rebuke,  while  the  culprit,  instantaneously 
oblivious  of  his  Trappist  vow,  flung  himself  into  a 
noisily  jocose  rallying  of  the  taciturn  Guardsman, 
who  received  his  taunts  without  the  least  appear- 
ance of  attention  or  interest.  D'Albiac  and  his 
lover,  thus  released  from  general  notice,  found  oc- 
casion to  engage  in  a  conversation  on  their  own  ac- 
count; trivial  on  the  surface,  as  all  their  conversa- 
tions were,  and  dealing  only  with  their  plans;  the 
houses  they  would  visit  in  the  autumn;  the  parties 
they  purposed  to  attend  in  the  near  future.  But  to 
D'Albiac,  at  least,  each  casual  word  was  charged 
with  deeper  and  sweeter  meanings.  Beneath 
each  cool,  commonplace  phrase  the  words  "  I  love 
you  "  seemed  to  sound  in  thrilling  counterpoint ;  and 
when  on  rare  occasions  the  proudly  demure  beauty 
raised  her  great  dark  eyes  an  instant  to  his  own, 
the  message  became  a  caress.  How  wonderful  it 
was  to  sit  beside  this  languorous,  exquisite  girl, 
who  scarcely  replied  at  times  to  his  questions,  and 
yet  to  feel,  by  the  magic  instinct  of  love,  that  every 
nerve  in  that  beautiful  body,  every  thought  in  that 
complex  and  delicate  mind,  thrilled  an  answering 
chord  to  the  sweep  of  his  own  emotion!  His  eyes 
on  her  apparently  unconscious  face,  he  forgot  the 
presence  of  his  fat,  amiable  hostess,  the  infantile 
quackings  of  Mr.  Colman,  who  was  pressing  un- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     43 

asked  advice  on  Mrs.  Fedden  as  to  the  arrange- 
ments of  her  new  Surrey  cottage  ("  Pouters  and 
f antails !  Yes,  yes,  you  shall !  I  insist  on  f antails ! 
You're  not  to  tease  me,  or  I  shall  cry!"),  the 
blatancy  of  Roddy  Chalmers,  the  imperturbable  ill- 
humour  of  Ivan,  a  future  brother  whom  he  had 
never  yet  been  able  to  appreciate,  although  he  ad- 
mired his  magnificent  English  phlegm.  The  pan- 
elled dining-room,  the  decorated  lunch-table,  the 
softly  moving  servants  vanished  from  his  eyes, 
and  he  was  alone  in  the  enchanted  rose-garden  with 
his  beloved,  and  she  held  her  arms  out  to  him  with 
a  passionate  gesture  of  abandonment,  and  heaven 
and  earth  flamed  and  dissolved  in  the  rapture  of 
her  kiss. 

He  awoke  with  a  start  to  the  realities  of  life 
as  she  rose  from  her  place,  holding  her  hand  out 
to  him  regretfully. 

"  I'm  afraid  I  shan't  see  you  upstairs,"  she  said, 
with  a  pout.  "  If  I  have  to  go  to  this  tiresome 
meeting  with  maman,  I  must  lie  down  for  an  hour 
first,  or  I  shall  be  a  complete  ruin.  Maman,  dar- 
ling, you  ought  to  have  a  rest,  too." 

The  proposal,  for  metabolic  reasons,  sounded 
agreeably  in  the  mother's  ear. 

"  Well,  darling,  perhaps  I  will,  a  little  later  on," 
she  replied.  "  Mrs  Fedden,  shall  we  go  upstairs  ?  " 

"  Oh,  I  think  I  ought  to  be  running  away  at 
once,  if  you'll  let  me,"  cried  Mrs.  Fedden,  tact- 


44     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

fully.  "  My  car  will  be  here  by  this  time,  and  I 
have  such  a  heap  of  things  to  do." 

"  Well,  then,  perhaps  you'll  look  after  the  gentle- 
men, Ivan,"  said  his  mother,  regarding  him  with 
distaste.  "  Good-bye,  Mr.  Colman ;  so  nice  of  you 
to  come.  Don't  think  it's  very  rude  of  me.  Good- 
bye, Roddy.  Henry,  we  shall  see  you  to-morrow, 
no  doubt." 

"  Give  my  love  to  the  Antis,  Miss  Beaufoy,"  said 
Roddy,  who  was  holding  the  door  open  for  the 
women  to  pass  out.  "  I  know  quarts  of  Antis ;  I 
think  they're  simply  killing." 

He  shut  the  door  behind  them  with  a  final  ex- 
plosion of  joy,  and  returned  to  the  table,  adding 
ruminatively : 

"And  there  are  some  jolly  nice-looking  women 
among  'em,  too." 

"  Claret,  Henry?  Colman,  what  are  you  drink- 
ing? Roddy?"  said  Ivan,  putting  the  wine  about. 

"  Nothing  for  me,  thank  you,"  said  Colman, 
with  a  serpentine  movement  of  the  body.  "  I  must 
be  off,  too,  before  long.  D'Albiac,  you've  made  us 
all  late;  and  I've  several  calls  to  make  this  after- 
noon." 

"  Fancy  that !  What  a  change  for  you,  old 
chap !  "  said  Roddy,  derisively.  "  Jools,  what  are 
you  up  to?  Anything?  Ivan  the  Horrible,  what's 
your  plans  ?  " 

Young  Beaufoy  hesitated  a  moment,  and  then, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     45 

without  raising  his  eyes  or  removing  his  cigar, 
grunted : 

"  Going  down  to  the  club." 

"  Oh,  of  course  when  a  man  says  that!  "  answered 
Roddy  elliptically.  "  I  hope  I  know  when  to  be 
discreet.  Jools,  do  you  desert  me?  Come  for 
a  turn  in  the  Park  with  me  and  amuse  me  with 
your  views  on  sport.  You  French  chaps  are  top- 
hole  on  that  subject.  You  persist  in  thinking  it 
matters.  Well,  so  did  we  once ;  but  we  know  better 
now,  and  so  we  generally  get  licked  by  everybody. 
Come  and  talk  to  me  about  ze  fox  'unting." 

D'Albiac  agreed  good-temperedly ;  not  that  he 
had  any  particular  liking  for  the  man's  society 
in  general,  considering  his  demeanour  to  be  un- 
Englishly  frivolous  and  deplorably  wanting  in  that 
cold  reserve  which  he  himself  had  gone  through 
so  much  to  acquire.  But  a  chance  word  at  the 
lunch-table  had  set  his  curiosity  alight  and  revived 
an  odd  interest  which  he  had  considered  dead ;  and, 
when  a  short  time  later  he  found  himself  walking 
up  Mount  Street  alone  with  this  companion,  he  in- 
troduced the  matter  as  off-handedly  as  possible,  hav- 
ing led  up  to  the  question  of  extending  the  suffrage 
to  women  by  what  he  flattered  himself  were  five 
admirably  natural  conversational  developments. 

"  By  the  way,  talking  of  the  Suffragettes,"  he 
said  carelessly,  "  I  heard  you  mention  a  name  I 
knew  in  that  connexion  —  Evans.  I  came  across 


46     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

one  of  these  women  a  little  while  ago;  one  of 
what  I  believe  they  call  the  fighting  line;  a  Mrs. 
Evans;  and  I  wondered  if  yours  was  the  same 
person." 

"What  was  yours  like?  Pretty?"  enquired 
Roddy. 

"  Well,  yes,  I  s'pose  some  people  would  say  so," 
said  D'Albiac  carelessly.  "  Thin  woman;  ordinary 
height,  but  not  much  of  her ;  brown  hair  and  rather 
noticeably  blue  eyes." 

"  H'm !  You  French  fellows  notice  that  sort  of 
thing  a  jolly  sight  too  much,"  said  Roddy,  himself 
an  innocent  and  purposeless  philanderer  of  the  most 
shameless  kind,  whose  path  was  in  a  constant  bloom 
of  pink  cheeks  and  bright  eyes  in  consequence  of 
the  erroneous  impression  of  particular  admiration 
that  he  made  among  the  women  of  all  classes  with 
whom  he  mixed.  "  That's  her,  right  enough. 
Where  did  you  come  across  her  ?  " 

D'Albiac  laughed  constrainedly. 

"  Why,  in  a  row,  of  all  places  —  a  street  fight. 
Indeed,  I  helped  her  to  get  away  when  she  was  in 
a  rather  awkward  fix — " 

Roddy  uttered  a  cry  of  delight  that  caused  quite 
a  stir  among  the  pedestrians  of  Park  Lane. 

"  You  do  take  the  bun,  Jools,"  he  protested, 
smacking  him  on  the  back  with  so  much  unneces- 
sary force  that  his  tall  hat  toppled  over  his  eyes. 
"  So  you've  been  playing  Perseus,  you  giddy  old 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     47 

French  ox,  have  you?  What  does  the  lovely  Miss 
Beaufoy  say?  " 

"  What  nonsense !  "  laughed  D'Albiac  nervously, 
with  a  slight  increase  of  colour,  and  a  guilty  hope 
that  this  chattering  fellow  would  not  retail  the  ad- 
venture to  Patrice,  an  action  that  he  had  not  the 
face  to  prohibit.  "  You've  got  a  bad  mind,  Roddy. 
I  always  told  you  so.  But  it  struck  me  as  odd  that 
you  should  actually  know  her." 

"  Oh,  everybody  knows  Flora,"  said  Roddy, 
casually  and  silently  buying  an  orange  from  an  aged 
vendor,  who  was  seated  by  the  Park  railings,  and 
instantly  passing  it  on  without  explanation  to  an 
amazed  street  child  who  stood  admiring  her  wares. 

"I  don't,"  said  D'Albiac. 

"  You,  Jools  ?  You  don't  know  anybody,  except 
silly  old  rotters  like  Colman.  You  know  nothing 
of  the  world  you  live  in.  Have  you  ever  even  heard 
the  name  of  Jack  Roff?  Not  you.  And  yet  I  say 
unto  you,  that  man's  only  got  to  lift  his  hand,  and 
London  would  be  sacked  in  twelve  hours." 

"  Well,  why  doesn't  he  ?  "  enquired  D'Albiac. 

"  Because  he  don't  want  it  sacked ;  he's  a  jolly 
sight  too  comfortable  as  he  is.  However,  there's 
a  Power;  and  you  were  never  even  aware  he  ex- 
isted. Of  course  you  wouldn't  know  Flora.  But 
I  tell  you  what,"  he  added,  signalling  to  a  passing 
motor-cab,  "  you  shall  know  her,  and  that  before 
another  sun  has  set.  Nip  in !  " 


'48     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  Why  ?     What's  up  now  ?  "  protested  his  friend. 

"  Get  in,  and  I'll  tell  you.  Don't  be  frightened  ; 
I'll  pay  the  fare.  This  is  my  treat.  Put  us  down 
on  Chelsea  Embankment  by  the  Church,  driver." 

"  No,  no !  Look  here !  I  don't  want  to  be  taken 
to  see  Mrs.  Evans,"  cried  D'Albiac,  remembering 
that  she  had  said  she  lived  in  Chelsea.  "  Don't  be 
a  fool,  Roddy." 

"What's  the  good  of  asking  impossibilities?" 
asked  Roddy,  bursting  into  a  paroxysm  of  glee, 
under  the  influence  of  which  he  stamped  his  foot 
delightedly  on  the  cab  floor,  and  grew  quite  purple 
of  complexion.  "  Don't  funk  it,  Jools.  Soo,  soo ! 
Good  boy!  Rats!  Shall  a  Frenchman  be  shy? 
Perish  the  thought!  Fancy  one  of  your  country- 
men refusing  to  be  taken  to  see  a  woman  —  una 
phamme!  Think  again.  Don't  you  feel  the  influ- 
ence beginning  to  work  ?  " 

"  But  she'll  think  I'm  quite  cracked  — "  began 
D'Albiac  feebly. 

"Not  she!  Why?  I  know  her  quite  well.  Why 
shouldn't  I  call,  and  bring  a  friend  with  me?  Par- 
ticularly when  you  saved  her  from  the  mad  bull, 
you  know.  Besides,  if  she  did  think  you  were 
cracked,  she'd  like  you  all  the  better.  You'd  match 
the  rest  of  her  circle  of  acquaintance.  You  never 
saw  such  a  lot  of  rum  'uns  as  the  people  she  knows." 

The  flustered  Frenchman  sank  back  philo- 
sophically. After  all,  in  his  inner  heart,  although 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     49 

he  would  not  admit  it,  he  was  well  aware  that  he 
had  only  begun  these  enquiries  about  Mrs.  Evans 
in  the  unacknowledged  hope  that  they  would  lead 
to  a  renewal  of  his  acquaintance  with  a  personality 
that  had  left  a  distinct  impression  on  him,  and 
one  of  a  puzzlingly  pleasant  kind.  Frequently  since 
that  odd  adventure  of  his,  he  had  voluntarily  re- 
created the  picture,  with  a  conscientious  comment  of 
"  Stupid  little  creature !  "  or  "  Rowdy  little  brute !  " 
as  a  dismissal  of  the  protagonist  at  length  from  his 
mind.  He  told  himself  that  he  took  no  interest 
in  the  woman,  only  in  the  unusual  circumstances. 
Yet  the  word  "  little "  might  have  sounded  a 
bugle  call  of  warning  to  a  more  frankly  analytic 
mind;  for  she  was  not  noticeably  small  of 
stature. 

"  Oh,  well,  I  don't  mind,"  he  said  carelessly,  with 
a  feeling  that  it  would  look  suspicious  to  make  too 
strong  a  protest.  "  Don't  make  me  hang  about 
there  long,  in  case  she's  in.  I've  got  a  lot  of  things 
to  do." 

"I  don't  think,"  said  Roddy,  vulgarly.  "Ah! 
You  won't  want  to  go  away  once  you  get  there, 
Jools.  I  know  you  when  you  get  near  a  pretty 
woman.  She's  a  jolly  good  sort,  too,  and  thunder- 
ing clever.  She  can  paint  portraits,  no  end.  Why 
don't  you  have  your  peculiar  features  limned,  as 
a  present  for  Miss  Patrice?" 

"  How  on  earth  do  you  come  to  be  a  friend  of 


go     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

hers?"  asked  D'Albiac,  putting  aside  this  absurdity 
without  comment. 

"  Why,  I  met  her  and  a  whole  crowd  more  of 
these  Suffrage  girls  at  Violet  Verney's,  as  I  was 
telling  your  future  ma  at  lunch.  (What  a  rise  I 
got  out  of  her,  didn't  I?)  Well,  I  arrived  in  the 
middle  of  what  they  call  a  drawing-room  meeting 
for  the  Cause."  He  paused  to  emit  a  scream  as  of 
a  train  leaving  a  tunnel,  and,  thus  relieved,  con- 
tinued. "  Servants  tried  to  keep  me  out,  but  as 
soon  as  I  heard  what  was  up  I  insisted  on  getting 
in,  and  Violet,  who's  rather  a  pal  of  mine  you  know 
—  we  used  to  roll  down  hills  in  each  other's  arms ; 
not  lately,  Jools,  don't  look  so  prudish;  when  we 
were  kids  —  Violet  said  I  might  stop  if  I  swore 
to  be  quiet.  So  I  was." 

"  I  can  imagine,"  commented  D'Albiac. 

"  I  was ;  I  was  as  taciturn  as  a  turnip.  And 
by-and-by  Violet  was  so  impressed  by  my  behaviour 
that  she  introduced  me  to  a  lot  of  'em;  and  jolly 
girls  they  were,  some  of  'em.  And  then  I  got  into 
conversation  with  Flora  and  saw  her  home.  She 
rather  took  to  me,  Jools;  I  don't  know  whether  it 
was  my  beauty  or  the  belief  that  she'd  make  me  into 
one  of  their  lambs.  At  any  rate  she  asked  me  to 
come  and  see  her,  and  for  some  time  I  used  to  look 
in  on  her  pretty  often ;  but  I  haven't  been  near  her 
for  some  months  now." 

"Why  not?" 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     51 

"  I  don't  know.  Oh,  because  I've  too  many 
friends,  I  s'pose.  I  shall  have  to  make  a  list  of 
'em  all  some  day;  edit  it  and  expurgate  it;  and 
then  I  can  divide  my  time  systematically  among  the 
people  I  want  to  keep  up.  As  it  is  I'm  constantly 
remembering  that  I  haven't  seen  one  of  my  best 
pals  for  four  years  or  so,  y'know.  That  sometimes 
cools  'em  off  a  little." 

D'Albiac  stared  out  of  the  cab  some  moments 
in  silence,  while  his  friend  was  lighting  a  cigarette. 

"Husband  a  friend  of  yours,  too?"  he  asked 
presently. 

"  Ah,  I  see  you  coming !  "  said  Roddy,  frowning 
heavily.  "  She  hasn't  got  one.  The  lamented 
Evans  passed  peacefully  away  during  the  early  part 
of  the  South  African  War,  I  believe;  having  in- 
judiciously tried  to  field  a  shell  from  Long  Tom. 
So  there  goes  your  last  chance,  Jools." 

"  What  do  you  mean  by  that  ?  "  asked  D'Albiac, 
irritably. 

"  Don't  tell  me !  I  know  your  race,"  answered 
the  other,  wagging  his  head,  with  his  eyes  goggling 
vaguely.  "  It  wasn't  for  nothing  that  I  worked 
my  way,  with  the  help  of  a  pocket  dictionary,  which 
left  out  most  of  the  best  words,  through  *  Nana,' 
when  I  was  young  and  enquiring.  But  it's  no  good, 
old  chap!  Your  charms  won't  have  any  more  ef- 
fect on  Flora  than  on  the  lions  in  Trafalgar 
Square." 


52     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"Really,  Roddy,"  began  D'Albiac  hotly;  for 
since  his  engagement  he  was  morbidly  sensitive  on 
these  subjects.  His  protest  was,  however,  drowned 
in  the  roars  of  his  friend,  to  whom  his  indignant 
face  afforded  an  infinite  gratification. 

"  What  a  refreshing  old  bird  you  are  to  pull  the 
tail  of,  Jools!"  he  cried  when  he  had  recovered 
breath.  "  Hullo !  here's  the  church.  We  get  out 
here." 


Ill 

HAVING  dismissed  their  cab,  the  two  friends 
turned  up  the  narrow  street  that  runs  beside  the 
parish  church,  Roddy  clasping  D'Albiac's  arm  af- 
fectionately as  they  went. 

"  We  now,"  he  explained  in  a  high,  cicerone 
tone,  to  the  wonder  of  the  passers-by,  "  approach 
the  slum  areas  in  which  your  artists  think  it  neces- 
sary to  hang  out;  so  mind  your  pockets,  Jools,  if 
you're  lucky  enough  to  have  anything  in  'em.  As 
for  me,  I'm  like  our  vacuous  friend  Viator,  with 
whom  old  Homer  makes  such  noise,  I  can  afford  to 
sing;  and  that's  about  the  only  thing  I  can  afford 
until  next  September.  Up  here." 

They  entered  a  small  paved  footway,  between 
rows  of  two-storied  houses  of  mean  appearance 
running  east  and  west.  Before  one  of  these,  on 
the  northern  side,  a  white-plastered,  narrow  slip 
of  a  dwelling,  Roddy  presently  paused. 

"  This  is  fair  Rosamond's  bower,"  he  said,  "  and 
that's  her  window  —  the  open  one.  Wonder  if 
she's  in?" 

As  a  means  of  determining  the  point,  he  gave  a 
piercing  cry  of  "  Flora ! "  which  brought  all  the  in- 
habitants of  the  court  to  their  windows,  and  among 
them  Mrs.  Evans,  who  thrust  her  brown  head  out 

S3 


54     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

of  the  room  he  had  indicated,  and  laughed  as  she 
saw  who  her  visitor  was. 

"  I  might  have  guessed  it  was  you,"  she  said, 
nodding  gaily;  and  then  looking  at  D'Albiac  for  a 
moment  with  raised  eyebrows,  she  repeated  the 
smile  and  the  nod. 

"  Come  up !  "  she  said.  "  The  door's  open,  and 
I've  nobody  with  me." 

Up  a  rather  rickety  wooden  stairway  Roddy  led 
his  friend  into  the  room  where  Flora  Evans  was 
at  work;  an  apartment  of  larger  size  than  had  ap- 
peared possible  from  the  exterior,  running  across 
the  whole  depth  of  the  little  house,  and  furnished, 
on  the  side  away  from  the  street,  with  slanting 
windows  running  up  to  the  roof,  "  to  catch,"  ex- 
plained the  owner,  "  any  chance  ray  of  light  which 
might  have  lost  its  way  and  wandered  by  mistake 
into  London."  Through  these  windows  a  toler- 
ably open  view  was  obtained  of  timber  yards,  back 
gardens,  ornamented  with  washing  lines  and  rumi- 
native cats,  and  a  large  building  which  appeared  to 
be  some  form  of  school  or  institute. 

Flora,  herself,  had  been  employed,  at  a  high  stand- 
ing desk,  in  making  a  large  decorative  design  in 
charcoal;  and  further  evidence  of  her  customary 
activities  was  afforded  by  a  few  studies  of  heads  in 
oil-colours  that  hung  against  the  walls.  The  studio 
was  apparently  used  also  as  a  living-room.  Th.ere 
was  a  little  Chinese  lacquered  bureau  against  one 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     55 

wall ;  a  square  table  covered  with  a  blue  serge  cloth, 
and  bearing  a  slender  glass  vase  containing  three 
dark  red  roses;  a  white  glazed  stove,  with  a  pipe 
leading  out  through  the  upper  part  of  the  back  wall ; 
a  "  saddle-bag  "  chair  and  one  or  two  dark  ones  of 
bent-wood;  and  a  hanging  corner  cupboard,  on  the 
top  of  which  was  ranged  an  exiguous  row  of  shabby 
books.  Everything  was  most  inartistically  tidy  and 
fresh,  and  the  June  breeze  playing  freely  through 
the  room  from  the  open  windows  on  both  sides, 
rustled  the  rose-leaves  in  the  slim  vase,  and  brought 
a  faint  sweetness  to  the  senses  from  the  velvet 
glory  of  the  regal  flowers. 

The  artist  herself  was  a  slim,  girlish  figure  in 
her  plain  brown  holland  dress,  with  a  soft,  low, 
white  collar  round  her  long  throat,  and  a  leather 
belt  about  her  slender  waist ;  and  her  laughing  face 
as  she  took  Roddy's  hand  set  D'Albiac  smiling  too, 
with  a  curious  sense  of  cheerfulness  that  warred  a 
little  with  his  usually  self-conscious  correctness  of 
demeanour. 

"  So  here  you  are  again,  you  false  friend,"  said 
Flora,  shaking  Roddy's  hand  heartily.  "  I  thought 
you'd  died  long  ago." 

"  Ah,  you've  been  peaking  and  pining ;  I  can  see 
that,"  he  answered,  with  a  mournful  shake  of  the 
head,  followed  by  a  prolonged  laugh  of  so  stun- 
ning a  description  that  Flora  clapped  her  hands  to 
her  ears,  with  pursed  lips  and  tightly  shut  eyes.  "  A 


56     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

slight  cold  in  my  head  —  nothing  serious  —  don't 
turn  pale  —  " 

"  For  a  year  ?  "  she  asked,  sympathetically. 

"  Oh,  I  say,  steady ! "  cried  Roddy  in  protest. 
"  Come  on !  Forgive  me.  Look  what  a  pretty 
present  I've  brought  you,  to  make  my  peace." 

He  drew  D'Albiac  forward  by  the  arm  as  he 
spoke,  rather  to  the  annoyance  of  the  Frenchman, 
who  felt  an  unwonted  shyness  in  thus  being  turned 
into  a  subject  of  laughter.  Flora's  expression  re- 
assured him  however;  there  was  nothing  of  rail- 
lery and  everything  of  friendliness  in  her  frank, 
lively  face  as  she  held  out  her  hand. 

"  But  we've  met  before,"  she  said,  turning  her 
dancing  blue  eyes  on  his.  "  And  in  a  most  martial 
manner.  How  nice  of  you  to  come  and  see  me! 
I've  often  thought,  since  that  time,  that  it  was 
rather  rude  of  me  to  leave  you  in  such  a  sudden 
way,  after  your  kindness.  But  you  struck  me,  do 
you  know?  as  just  as  little  sorry  afterwards  that 
you'd  done  it,  so  I  believed  you'd  probably  be  glad 
to  see  the  last  of  me.  And  now  I'm  proved  wrong, 
so  I'll  apologise." 

D'Albiac  began  to  murmur  a  few  conventional 
phrases  on  the  pleasure  of  renewing  the  acquaint- 
ance, which  somehow  struck  himself  as  a  little  frigid 
in  face  of  this  effusiveness;  so  that  he  was  not 
sorry  when  Roddy  burst  in  with  a  fresh  flood  of 
nonsense. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     57 

"  Pore  old  Jools !  He's  been  searching  London 
for  you  ever  since.  '  Tell  me,  shepherds,  tell  me, 
have  you  seen  my  Flora  —  '  I'm  a  little  out  of  voice 
to-day,  so  we'll  omit  the  rest  and  take  up  the  col- 
lection. And  it's  only  this  afternoon  that  his  per- 
sistence has  been  rewarded  by  hearing  a  chance  re- 
mark of  mine  about  you." 

"  Don't  be  idiotic,"  said  Flora,  with  prosaic  good 
temper.  "  You  haven't  even  told  me  your  friend's 
name  yet." 

"What?  Old  Jools's?  His  name  and  style  in 
his  own  land  is  the  Markee  Hongree  D'Albiac ;  but 
for  political  reasons  he  veils  these  splendours  over 
here  under  the  disguise  of  Mr.  D'Albiac;  known 
to  myself  as  Jools,  for  no  particular  reason,  except 
that  it  seems  to  suit  him.  And  here  he  comes  to 
ask  you  to  paint  his  portrait  in  the  natural  colours, 
as  a  present  for  his  young  lidy  —  there,  that's  done 
it!  Now  I've  given  the  whole  show  away,  and  de- 
stroyed all  his  interest !  " 

Clapping  his  hand  over  his  mouth,  Chalmers 
made  a  great  parade  of  annoyance  at  this  slip  of 
the  tongue,  while  Flora  addressed  Henry. 

"  Don't  encourage  him  by  laughing,  Mr. 
D'Albiac,  please,"  she  said.  "  But  I  don't  yet  see 
how  you  found  out  I  was  a  friend  of  his.  You 
didn't  even  know  my  name." 

"  Yes,  you  mentioned  it  that  night,  by  chance. 
So  of  course  when  Chalmers  spoke  of  a  Mrs.  Evans 


58     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

who  was  an  active  suffragist,  it  occurred  to  me  at 
once  that  it  was  probably  the  same  lady."  He  hesi- 
tated a  moment,  feeling  he  ought  to  give  some  sort 
of  explanation  of  his  visit.  It  was  hardly  enough 
to  say  "You  stuck  in  my  memory  as  having  a  pretty 
face  which,  in  spite  of  my  matrimonial  engage- 
ments, I  felt  I  should  be  glad  to  see  again."  And 
yet  that  was  the  only  reason  he  could  find,  in  a  can- 
did examination  of  his  mind,  for  his  having  per- 
mitted Chalmers  to  bring  him  down  on  this  fool's 
errand.  It  was  necessary  to  say  something,  how- 
ever, so  he  took  refuge  in  a  rather  obvious  in- 
sincerity. "I  was  anxious  to  know  that  your  were 
none  the  worse  for  your  —  your  misadventure," 
he  continued,  smiling  formally.  "And  then,"  he 
added,  wilily,  "  I  wanted  to  be  allowed  to  talk  to 
you  about  your  cause;  because  it's  often  struck  me 
since  our  meeting  that  there  must  be  a  great  deal 
to  be  said  for  these  methods  —  which  I  must  say 
I've  always  very  much  disliked  —  if  people  of  your 
type  take  part  in  them." 

Roddy  who  had  behaved  pretty  well  during  this 
speech,  except  for  a  rather  vulgar  splutter  of  laugh- 
ter behind  his  hand  at  the  announcement  of  the 
second  reason  for  D'Albiac's  visit,  broke  in  here. 
"  You've  come  to  the  right  shop  if  you  want  a 
great  deal  to  be  said,'  old  chap.  Flora's  the  Chelsea 
champion  at  that." 

"  Satan  rebuking  sin,"  said  Mrs.  Evans  contemp- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     59 

tuously.  "I'm  sure  I  shall  be  very  pleased  to  try 
and  explain  our  point  of  view,  Mr.  D'Albiac. 
You'd  probably  be  an  easy  convert,  if  you  don't 
mind  me  saying  so.  It's  the  dull,  trivial,  apathetic 
people  that  are  our  deadliest  enemies.  Perhaps 
you'll  come  and  see  me  some  time  without  this  ab- 
surd person,  who's  a  bar  to  all  serious  conversation. 
I  don't  mean  that  as  an  insult,  Roddy;  rather  the 
contrary,  indeed.  I'm  inclined  to  be  a  solemn 
creature  myself,  and  I'm  sure  your  company  does 
me  worlds  of  good  —  in  moderation." 

"Well,  you  needn't  have  added  that.  It  was  a 
prettier  speech  as  it  stood  first,  you  know,"  Roddy 
commented  dispassionately.  "  Come  on !  What 
shall  we  do?  Let's  all  go  to  Battersea  Park,  and 
I'll  stand  you  both  a  ninepenny  ad  lib.  tea." 

"  I  ought  to  finish  my  work  — "  began  Flora, 
doubtfully,  but  with  a  glance  at  the  sunlit 
street. 

"  Work?  "  cried  Roddy  in  disgust.  "  Work,  on 
an  afternoon  like  this?  Why,  it's  flying  in  the  face 
of  Providence,  which  you  ought  to  know  is  one 
of  the  most  dangerous  forms  of  aviation.  And 
here's  our  first  meeting  for  long,  weary  years! 
Work  be  blowed !  Look  ~here,  I'll  come  in  again 
to-morrow  and  help  you  to  finish  it.  Say  yes, 
there's  a  good  girl." 

"  I  s'pose  you  won't  give  me  any  peace  unless  I 
do,"  sighed  Flora,  covering  her  drawing  and  push- 


60     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

ing  the  desk  into  a  corner.  "  All  right.  Give  me 
a  minute  to  put  my  hat  and  shoes  on." 

Relying  on  the  usually  liberal  interpretation  put 
by  ladies  on  the  word  "minute,"  where  hats  are 
concerned,  Roddy  Chalmers  had  begun  to  inspect 
the  contents  of  the  corner  cupboard,  when  Flora  re- 
turned unexpectedly  and  discovered  him. 

"  Now,  leave  things  alone,"  she  said  sternly.  "  I 
won't  have  you  putting  your  ringers  in  the  jampots. 
Mr.  D'Albiac  you  ought  to  have  kept  your  eye  on 
him." 

D'Albiac  gravely  stammered  an  apology,  which 
caused  the  painter's  blue  eyes  to  rest  on  him  for  a 
moment  with  an  air  of  amusement  that  he  was 
quick  to  notice  and  resent.  He  confessed  to  him- 
self that  he  felt  "  out  of  it " ;  he  wished  he  had  not 
been  such  a  fool  as  to  come;  he  did  not  understand 
women  of  this  kind.  Roddy  and  she  treated  each 
other  as  two  schoolboys,  except  that  their  manners 
and  language  were  without  offence.  The  young 
women  to  whom  D'Albiac  was  accustomed  had  al- 
ways received  him  with  a  certain  reserve;  if  un- 
married, with  an  indefinable  air  of  fluttered  pleasure 
that  ministered  agreeably  to  his  self-esteem;  mar- 
ried or  unmarried,  with  a  certain  attitude  of  re- 
spect and  deference  to  his  sex,  which  raised  him  in 
his  own  opinion  and  made  conversation  assume  the 
form  of  instruction,  in  which  he  was  the  master. 
There  were  women  of  easier  morality  and  low 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     61 

class,  of  course,  who  treated  him  with  a  canaille 
disrespect  and  insolence ;  but  that  was  only  tolerated 
for  its  piquancy  and  as  a  temporary  diversion, 
much  as  one  allows  a  puppy  to  bite  one  in  sport, 
until  one  has  had  enough  of  it,  when  it  may  be 
kicked  into  a  corner,  until  the  inclination  for  a 
contemptuous  indulgence  of  its  impudence  returns. 
And  in  these  ladies  there  was  always  present  an  air 
of  greatly  daring,  a  ring  of  defiance  in  the  tones 
of  their  voices  and  in  their  often  tasteless  choice  of 
words.  Mrs.  Evans'  demeanour  was  more  that  of 
a  free-and-easy  young  man,  when  thrown  into  con- 
tact with  one  of  his  own  age  and  sex.  She  made 
no  attempt  to  court  D'Albiac  or  draw  him  out,  but 
threw  her  remarks  to  him  with  perfect  friendliness, 
for  him  to  respond  to  or  not  as  he  thought  fit.  Un- 
doubtedly there  was  a  sort  of  pleasure  in  her  soci- 
ety, which  was  not  entirely  due  to  her  physical 
qualities,  although  these  struck  D'Albiac  as  consid- 
erably more  attractive  than  he  had  at  first  sup- 
posed; but  it  galled  him,  too,  to  be  dethroned  from 
the  position  he  was  accustomed  to  occupy,  and 
treated  with  no  more  interest  by  a  woman  than 
if  the  difference  in  sex  had  never  been  invented. 
It  made  him  stiff  and  formal ;  it  added  to  his  usual 
horror  of  becoming  matter  for  derision  or  adverse 
public  comment;  and  at  the  same  time  it  inspired 
him  with  a  desire  to  make  himself  more  important 
in  the  eyes  of  this  carelessly  companionable  young 


person,  to  show  her  that,  although  perhaps  he  had 
not  the  utter  want  of  restraint  and  conventional 
politeness  of  Roddy  Chalmers,  yet  that  he  was  not, 
for  all  that,  a  dull  dog;  and  in  all  other  respects 
greatly  the  better  man  of  the  two. 

Absurd  as  this  desire  to  shine  in  the  eyes  of  a 
woman   of   Mrs.    Evans'   class   and   character   ap- 
peared   to    his    conscious    intelligence,    particularly 
in    view    of    the     fact    that    it    seemed    neces- 
sary   for    such    effulgence    to    assume    manners 
which     he     knew     well     would     be     both     vul- 
gar   and    ridiculous    in    the    eyes    of    the    girl 
he  loved,  yet  the  feeling  was  not  to  be  routed, 
though  the  proverbial  English  morgue,  which  he 
had  been  at  such  pains  to  acquire  during  the  last 
few  years,  stood  in  the  way  of  his  efforts  to  ap- 
pear   sympathetically    lively    and    unconventional. 
Roddy's  outrageous  noisiness  did  not  appear  at  all 
to  offend  Flora  Evans,   although  she  herself  be- 
haved reasonably  enough  in  the  streets.     D'Albiac, 
however,  could  have  wished  that  she  wore  gloves 
or  at  least  carried  a  parasol;  there  was  something 
that  offended  his  eyes  in  the  sight  of  her  walking 
with  bare,  hanging  hands,  occasionally  putting  one 
up  to  her  unpinned  hat  of  soft  brown  felt,  to  alter 
its  position  on  her  head  or  hold  it  against  a  gust 
of  wind.     He  knew  it  was  rather  trivial  to  be  so 
particular  in  these  matters;  but,  after  all,  quite  good 
people  live  in  Chelsea  now-a-days,  he  thought ;  some 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     63 

of  the  inhabitants  of  the  great  red-brick  palaces 
were  personally  known  to  him;  and  it  was  not  an 
agreeable  reflection  that  at  any  moment  he  might 
find  himself  face  to  face  with  some  obviously  aston- 
ished friend,  capable  of  putting  a  very  questionable 
construction  on  the  fact  of  his  companionship  with 
a  woman  who  might  well  be  a  sempstress  or  shop 
girl;  who  was,  in  sober  fact,  little  better.  The 
thought  strengthened  to  a  pitch  that  induced  him,  by 
a  happy  thought,  to  stop  behind  the  other  two  to 
light  a  cigar,  and  in  catching  them  up  again  to 
secure  that  Roddy  should  be  between  him  and  the 
woman,  until  at  least  they  were  across  the  river, 
where  they  would  be  in  safety.  If  an  awkward 
encounter  was  to  take  place,  Mrs.  Evans  should 
at  least  pass  as  Roddy's  friend  and  not  his  own. 
She  herself  did  not  appear  to  notice  the  effect 
of  his  sly  manoeuvre,  but  continued  the  tripartite 
conversation  with  undiminished  good  fellowship. 

They  turned  into  the  Park  through  the  small 
wooden  gate  immediately  beyond  the  bridge,  and 
at  Roddy's  special  request  went  first  to  call  upon 
a  particular  friend  of  his;  a  raven  who,  with  his 
lady  wife,  kept  house  in  a  small  circular  aviary 
among  a  plantation  of  trees.  Like  many  of  Chal- 
mers' intimates,  however,  the  portentous  fowl  had 
not  had  the  enjoyment  of  his  society  for  a  con- 
siderable time,  and  the  apologies  that  Roddy  felt 
it  necessary  to  offer  the  bird  on  this  point,  and  of 


64     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

his  omission  to  bring  with  him  a  meat-offering  — 
apologies  which  it  received  with  frank  incredulity, 
expressed  in  the  tilt  of  its  head  and  the  twinkle  of 
its  brilliant  eyes,  as  it  hearkened  to  the  improbable 
excuses  offered  —  had  the  effect  of  drawing  so  con- 
siderable a  crowd  of  delighted  listeners,  largely 
young  women  and  children,  about  the  party,  that 
D'Albiac  drew  some  distance  away  among  the  trees, 
to  wait  until  the  visit  was  over.  The  pushing  and 
heavy  breathing  of  the  little  crowd,  the  clickings  of 
tongues,  squeaks  of  laughter  and  admiring  expres- 
sions of  surprise  and  amusement,  the  constant 
treading  of  small  feet  on  his  varnished  boots,  and 
the  sight  of  round  eyes  looking  up  merrily  into  his 
own,  to  see  if  he  shared  their  owner's  delight  in  this 
stupidly  ostentatious  exhibition  of  nonsense,  an- 
noyed D'Albiac  very  much;  the  more  as  he  per- 
ceived that  their  woman  companion,  leaning  her 
elbow  on  the  rail  that  enclosed  the  cage,  frankly 
enjoyed  such  tomfoolery,  and  even  encouraged 
Roddy  by  suggestive  remarks  when  his  wit  halted. 
He  had  a  momentary  thought  of  leaving  them  there 
and  returning  to  the  less  savage  parts  of  London,  to 
associate  with  people  of  civilized  habits.  It  would 
be  rude,  no  doubt,  but  what  did  it  matter  what  this 
common  little  person  thought  about  him?  He  was 
here  entirely  against  his  will,  and  was  not  at  all 
likely  to  repeat  the  experience.  As  for  Roddy, 
D'Albiac  was  quite  aware  that  such  a  defection 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     65 

would  not  even  momentarily  surprise  him.  It  was 
precisely  the  sort  of  thing  he  himself  did,  in  all 
circles  of  society;  he  would  only  take  it  for  granted 
that  D'Albiac  had  suddenly  become  bored  and  be- 
thought himself  of  something  more  amusing  to  do ; 
which  would  have  been,  in  his  opinion,  an  ade- 
quate excuse  for  an  even  graver  breach  of  good 
manners.  Before  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to  this 
course,  however,  he  found  the  opportunity  was  lost, 
for  here  came  his  two  companions ;  Roddy  with  his 
tall  hat  on  the  back  of  his  head,  gasping  with  mean- 
ingless laughter,  and  rolling  a  wild,  unseeing  eye; 
and  Mrs.  Evans,  her  merry  face  dimpled  and 
sparkling,  talking  volubly;  behind  them  their  little 
crowd  of  admirers  stared  after  their  retreating 
footsteps.  Neither  of  them  appeared  conscious  of, 
or  at  least  called  any  verbal  attention  to  D'Albiac's 
withdrawal  from  their  company;  and,  in  his  rather 
irritable  frame  of  mind,  the  Frenchman  took  this 
as  an  added  grievance.  He  had  purposed,  as  he 
saw  them  coming,  to  drop  a  carefully  veiled  sar- 
casm at  their  expense,  to  defend  himself  from  their 
expected  charge  of  stiffness  and  shyness;  a  few 
happy  words  had  even  instantaneously  occurred  to 
him,  and  he  was  sensibly  disappointed  that  he  was 
given  no  reasonable  opportunity  for  their  display. 
He  felt  he  could  have  made  them  realise  that  it  is 
not  by  any  means  always  the  people  who  affect  to 
disregard  all  society's  rules  of  behaviour  who  thereby 


66     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

escape  the  charge  of  being  ridiculous  and  limited 
in  mind,  at  the  expense  of  those  who  prefer  to  con- 
form within  reason.  However,  as  they  were  both 
immovably  good-humoured  and  lively,  he  could 
hardly  make  a  personal  exhibition  of  acerbity, 
though  the  result  of  his  self-restraint  was  mani- 
fest in  an  obvious  sulkiness  of  demeanour,  as  he  un- 
willingly followed  them  on  to  the  wide  expanse  of 
grass,  bisected  by  a  railed  path,  that  occupies  the 
middle  portion  of  the  park. 

And  here  no  young  mind  and  healthy  body  could 
resist  the  witchery  of  the  hour  and  the  season. 
After  a  rainy  Spring,  the  two  great  enclosures  of 
grass  were  brilliantly  green  in  the  sunlight,  soft 
as  deep  moss  beneath  the  feet;  a  carpet  of  richest 
pile  for  the  few  lucky  children  within  view  to 
roll  upon  luxuriously;  the  most  sweet-smelling  and 
luxurious  of  couches  for  the  contemplative  out-of- 
work  labourer,  on  which  to  forget  his  trouble  over 
a  pipe  of  tobacco;  the  safest  training  ground  for  the 
young  mother  who,  in  the  middle  distance,  was 
instructing  her  staggering  two-year-old  in  the  dif- 
ficult art  of  walking;  almost  a  nuptial  couch  to 
certain  debonair  lovers,  scattered  here  and  there 
upon  the  gaudy  plain,  in  postures,  as  Roddy  said, 
no  less  indicative  of  the  sincerity  of  their  emo- 
tions than  of  their  complete  freedom  from  that  self- 
consciousness  which  is  customarily  one  of  the  be- 
setting sins  of  the  English.  Three  hundred  yards 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     67 

away  or  so,  a  line  of  still  freshly  bright  trees,  wav- 
ing their  tops  rhythmically  in  the  light  June  breeze, 
made  a  changing  and  stimulating  backing  to  the 
more  dazzling  colour  of  the  turf;  while  above  all 
rose  a  summer  sky  that  few  melancholies  could 
have  resisted,  pale  turquoise,  built  about,  wherever 
the  eye  could  see  its  lower  borders,  with  vast 
cumulose  cloud  continents  of  dazzling  whiteness 
and  a  solidity  that  suggested  a  breathless  repose 
in  the  upper  air,  contradicted  as  the  eye  rose 
towards  the  zenith  by  patches  of  cirrocumulus  that 
lost  little  by  little  their  regularity  of  form  and  were 
combed  out  at  last  into  curls  and  thistledown  strands 
of  creamy  cirrus,  delicate  as  the  stray  tendrils  of 
Flora's  soft  brown  hair  that  fluttered  from  beneath 
her  round,  boyish  hat;  pale  in  places  almost  to  the 
point  of  indistinction  from  the  surrounding  blue 
pallor  of  the  dome's  apex,  and  lending  an  inimit- 
able air  of  swift  movement  and  resistlessly  youth- 
ful life  to  the  smiling  face  of  the  June  day. 

Roddy  was  like  a  young  horse  who  leaves  the 
high  road  on  a  windy  morning  for  the  springy 
turf  of  the  Downs;  he  leapt  like  a  child  with  the 
joy  of  life;  Flora's  delicately  drawn  lips  of  fragile 
pink  parted  in  a  breathless  smile  of  physical  pleas- 
ure, as  she  stood  for  a  moment,  swaying  like  a 
young  birch  tree  in  the  wind  that  tugged  and  teased 
at  her  thin,  pale-brown  skirt,  and  tumbled  her  spun- 
silk  hair  about  her  rosy  face;  Henry  D'Albiac  for- 


68     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

got  for  the  moment  the  irksomeness  of  his  company 
and  had  a  strong  bodily  desire  for  action  and  move- 
ment to  express  his  sense  of  pleasure.  The  oppor- 
tunity was  given  by  Chalmers,  who  cried  out  at 
once  a  challenge  for  a  race  to  the  low  pavilion  that 
lay  two  hundred  yards  or  more  before  them;  a 
haunt  of  children,  the  robber's  cave  of  a  thousand 
games.  The  words  were  hardly  out  of  his  lips  be- 
fore Flora  was  away,  running  like  a  boy ;  elbows  to 
her  sides,  fists  clenched,  body  erect,  and  with  a 
fine,  light  swing,  as  unlike  the  graceless  waddle  of 
the  untrained,  petticoated  woman  of  a  previous 
generation  as  can  be  imagined.  The  instantaneous 
manner  in  which  her  rapid  mind  and  responsive 
body  had  answered  Chalmers'  defiance  had  taken 
the  challenger  so  much  by  surprise  that  she  had 
gained  a  lead  of  twenty  yards  before  he  started  in 
pursuit,  hopeless  as  it  proved,  for  the  breath  wasted 
on  laughter  and  shouted  accusations  of  dishonesty, 
added  to  the  comparative  unsuitability  of  his  rai- 
ment for  bodily  sports,  soon  left  him  totally  out- 
paced by  the  light  figure  that  scudded  silently  be- 
fore him  across  the  grass :  and  when  finally  his  tall- 
hat  blew  from  his  head  as  he  ran,  he  took  it  for  a 
good  excuse  to  give  up  the  unequal  task.  For  a 
few  steps  D'Albiac  had  joined  in  the  pursuit,  at 
first  with  an  eager,  unaffected  boyishness  of  emula- 
tion, the  next  moment  with  a  consciousness  of  the 
absurdity,  in  the  eyes  of  the  bystanders,  of  the  spec- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     69 

tacle  of  his  fashionable  figure,  glossy-booted,  tight- 
waisted  and  tall-hatted,  engaged  in  this  folly.  At 
the  thought,  he  began  to  run  with  a  delicate  circum- 
spection, laughing  to  give  himself  a  countenance, 
and  almost  immediately  afterwards  fell  back  into 
a  walking  pace,  with  a  frown  at  certain  urchins  who 
had  joined  with  him  in  the  chase,  crying  encourage- 
ments to  him  as  they  closely  accompanied  his  foot- 
steps. Their  disappointment  at  his  lack  of  persist- 
ence manifested  itself  in  tentative  words  of  deri- 
sion, which  caused  Henry  to  lift  his  cane  in  a  threat- 
ening manner  at  them ;  at  which  they  retreated  back- 
wards, with  contumelious  speech  and  opprobrious 
gestures,  which  intensified  as  the  distance  between 
them  increased;  while  D'Albiac  rejoined  Roddy 
who,  still  highly  entertained  by  his  defeat,  was 
brushing  his  damaged  hat  on  his  coat  sleeve. 

"  I  never  saw  such  a  girl  as  that,"  he  said  ad- 
miringly. "  She  takes  one's  breath  away,  she's  so 
quick.  Look,  she's  finished  already." 

From  the  still  distant  pavilion,  indeed,  Flora's 
slim  figure  could  be  seen,  waving  in  triumph  to 
celebrate  the  victory  of  her  sex;  a  signal  to  which 
Roddy  replied  by  injurious  remarks,  shouted  be- 
tween his  hands  as  he  approached  her.  D'Albiac 
felt  that  the  moment  for  escape  from  this  company 
had  come,  and  he  began  an  explanation  of  suddenly 
remembered  affairs,  appealing  to  his  watch  to  sup- 
port his  statements.  His  friend  was  not  deceived. 


70     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  I  know  what's  the  matter  with  you,  Jools," 
he  said,  taking  his  arm  lovingly.  "  You  don't  think 
we're  behaving  like  little  gentlemen.  Never  mind, 
don't  be  cross.  I  won't  rag  any  more,  really.  And 
you  promised  to  have  tea  with  us.  A  nice  cup  o' 
tea,  old  dear;  you  can't  say  no  to  that,  I'm  sure." 

Still  protesting  the  truth  of  his  obviously  men- 
dacious excuses,  Henry  suffered  himself  to  be  led 
forward,  with  little  belief  in  the  durability  of 
Roddy's  promise.  To  his  surprise,  however,  it  was 
reasonably  well  kept.  It  was  true  that  Chalmers 
hardly  spoke  a  word  of  sense  during  the  remainder 
of  the  afternoon,  but  that  was  due  rather  to  a  con- 
stitutional disability  than  to  any  deliberate  inten- 
tion on  his  part.  And  otherwise,  whether  from 
weariness  or  not,  his  behaviour  was  distinctly  chas- 
tened. His  laughter  was  considerably  modified  in 
volume  and  improved  in  tone,  and  he  did  not  arouse 
any  large  amount  of  popular  excitement,  more  than 
perhaps  half  a  dozen  times,  before  the  three  parted. 
In  these  circumstances,  D'Albiac  had  an  opportunity 
of  studying  Mrs.  Evans  by  a  more  sympathetic 
light.  Seated  with  his  companions  at  a  small  cir- 
cular table  on  the  terrace  of  a  refreshment  house, 
he  found  himself  yielding  more  and  more  to  the 
attraction  of  her  curious  friendliness  and  outspok- 
enness ;  two  characteristics  that  theoretically  repelled 
him  as  particularly  unladylike  and  even  un feminine. 
At  one  moment  she  would  be  seated  with  shoulders 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     71 

and  head  drooping,  her  hands  lying  in  her  lap,  look- 
ing upward  into  the  faces  of  her  companions,  and 
turning  her  blue  eyes  quickly  from  one  to  another, 
as  she  listened  with  a  curious  vigorousness  that 
marked  all  her  actions,  and  was  apparent  even  in 
her  silences;  the  next  she  would  have  burst  her 
way  into  the  conversation  in  a  perfect  flood  of 
volubility,  though  always  in  the  same  soft,  clear- 
cut  voice,  with  large  abundant  gestures,  and  light- 
ning flickerings  of  a  pair  of  particularly  pretty 
hands,  that  seemed  themselves  to  distil  speech  from 
the  rosy  tips  of  the  pointed  fingers.  She  did  not 
laugh  inordinately;  most  of  Roddy's  absurdities 
were  taken  with  a  friendly  contempt ;  but  she  smiled 
frequently  and  swiftly;  the  dimples  in  the  narrow 
cheeks,  the  crackle  of  blue  fire  in  the  eyes  and  the 
flash  of  small  teeth  between  curved  lips  were  here 
and  gone  in  a  breath,  and  when  the  laughter  came, 
it  rang  out  clear  and  sudden  as  a  small  silver  bell. 
D'Albiac  could  not  keep  his  eyes  off  her  face;  he 
felt  it  and  wondered  vaguely  at  this  sudden  obses- 
sion; she  was  pretty,  but  not  remarkably  so;  she 
was  still  young  enough  —  thirty,  perhaps  —  but  a 
mature  woman  and  no  girl ;  one  who  had  obviously 
suffered  and  experienced  life;  she  had  good  man- 
ners of  a  kind,  perhaps,  but  not  of  his  kind,  and 
distinctly  odd  and  irreverent;  nor  was  she  a  lady; 
an  excessive  accuracy  of  pronunciation  and  an  ab- 
sence of  fashionable  phrases  and  words  denoted 


72     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

one  of  the  well  educated  lower-middle  class;  one 
would  have  said  perhaps  a  secretary  or  governess 
or  journalist.  Nor  was  she  apparently  much  im- 
pressed with  D'Albiac ;  so  it  was  not  flattered  vanity 
that  accounted  for  his  undoubted  interest  in  her. 
She  gave  him  as  much  of  her  attention  as  she  gave 
that  clown,  Roddy;  certainly  no  more;  and  there 
were  moments  when  she  contemplatively  screwed 
her  mouth  a  little  on  one  side,  with  a  pouting  under- 
lip,  considering  his  face  meanwhile  with  eyes  of 
dancing  attention ;  or  tilted  her  head  over  a  rounded 
shoulder  to  glance  at  him  obliquely  with  an  elfish 
slyness;  and  at  such  times  he  was  hotly  convinced 
internally  that  she  was  privately  laughing  at  him, 
good-humouredly,  certainly,  but  with  genuine 
amusement.  On  one  or  two  of  these  occasions  he 
remembered  that  she  had  delivered  herself  of  some 
rebellious  opinion,  uttered  some  word  that  struck 
him  as  too  hardy,  or  broached  or  responded  to  some 
subject  that  he  considered  taboo  between  gentlemen 
and  ladies.  Of  course  he  was  aware  that  in  his 
own  country  married  women  were  allowed  and  took 
considerable  latitude  in  the  matter  of  conversation; 
but,  since  he  had  come  to  man's  estate,  he  had 
associated  so  much  with  the  English  that  he  had 
grown  to  expect  a  particular  demeanour  from  the 
women  he  met;  certain  reticencies  and  assumed  ig- 
norances, even  from  the  oldest  and  most  matronly, 
even  from  the  presumably  not  entirely  uninstructed 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     73 

mothers  of  large  families ;  and  these  rules  of  speech, 
though  not  by  any  means  flagrantly  broken  during 
the  afternoon  were,  he  could  see,  held  of  little  ac- 
count by  Flora  Evans,  who,  to  make  matters  worse, 
had  an  appearance  so  maidenly  and  lived  in  such 
lonely  circumstances  that  Henry  found  constant 
difficulty  in  reminding  himself  that  she  had  mar- 
ried, lost  her  husband,  suffered  and  known  —  per- 
haps borne  children,  though  there  were  none  actu- 
ally in  evidence.  He  tried  his  best  to  appear  thor- 
oughly Bohemian  in  his  replies  to  one  who  was 
so  widely  different  in  aspect  and  manner  from  what 
he  had  been  taught  to  consider  Bohemian,  but  it 
was  plain  that  his  pained  surprise  manifested  itself 
occasionally,  and  at  such  times  he  caught  that  de- 
tested suspicion  of  a  good-humoured  smile  in  the 
bright  eyes,  and  that  suggestion  of  slyness  in  the 
mere  carriage  of  the  head  and  body  which  gave  him 
a  hearty  longing  to  indulge  in  reprisals.  He  had 
a  fleeting  thought  of  uttering  some  outrageously 
frank  sentiment  and  phrase,  the  talk  of  the  smok- 
ing-room, for  the  pleasure  to  his  revengeful  feel- 
ings of  seeing  her  flush  or  withdraw  into  herself  at 
the  brutality.  But  in  the  face  of  her  manifestly 
crystalline  purity  of  mind  and  the  absence  of  the 
slightest  suggestion  of  a  wish  on  her  part  either 
to  shock  or  excite,  he  was  unable  so  far  to  forget 
his  decency.  After  all  the  woman  on  no  occasion 
said  or  suggested  more  than  the  most  clean-minded 


74     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

mature  man  would  communicate  without  hesitation 
to  another;  and  clearly  she  did  not  consider  herself 
or  her  company  as  possessed  of  any  sex,  except  on 
the  rare  occasions  when  a  start,  or  constrained 
reply,  or  slight  frown  from  D'Albiac  reminded  her 
of  the  fact  that  the  difference  existed.  As  for 
Roddy,  a  most  wholesome  imbecile,  for  all  his,  or 
perhaps  because  of  his,  constant  attentions  to 
women,  he  was  evidently  quite  at  home  in  this 
unconventional  society;  but  D'Albiac  caught  him- 
self wondering  what  his  sweetly-ignorant  betrothed 
would  say,  what  even  the  significantly  reticent  Mrs. 
Beaufoy  would  say,  if  either  of  them  could  have 
been  present  at  the  tea-party  and  heard  the  easy 
tones  of  good  fellowship  employed  and  marked  the 
entire  absence  of  those  little  arts  of  pleasing  and 
concealment  or  suggestion  (delicately  stimulating) 
which  obtain  in  all  good  society. 

For  all  his  restless  feeling  of  strangeness,  how- 
ever, and  fear  of  scrupulously  concealed  mockery, 
D'Albiac  found  himself  growing  more  and  more  at 
ease,  and  ever  greedier  of  Flora's  attention  and 
good  opinion,  as  the  afternoon  wore  away;  and  he 
was  able  to  cry  out  on  her,  in  a  perfectly  truthful 
protest  of  regret,  when  she  at  last  announced  that 
she  must  return  to  her  home  and  her  work. 
Roddy,  however,  immediately  seconded  the  pro- 
posal ;  he  was  a  person  devoid  of  stability,  and  had 
long  begun  to  weary  of  his  company,  having  lat- 


terly  fallen  into  occasional  fits  of  absent-minded 
silence,  induced  by  the  memory  of  a  pretty  friend 
of  his  in  a  flower  shop  in  Sackville  Street,  whom 
he  thought  it  would  be  pleasant  to  drop  in  upon 
for  some  minutes'  chat  on  his  way  home.  While 
there,  he  reflected,  he  might  buy  some  flowers  for 
poor  little  Lady  Vandervelde.  It  would  be  too  late 
to  call  on  the  pretty  invalid  to-night,  but  he  could 
leave  them  for  her  and  look  in  on  her  to-morrow; 
for  he  owed  her  a  call,  and  she  was  a  most  charm- 
ing woman,  too.  In  his  anxiety  to  carry  out  this 
double  scheme  of  amusement,  he  insisted  on  remov- 
ing his  friends  from  the  park  by  the  nearest  gate 
and  packing  them  into  a  cab,  dropping  Flora  at 
the  corner  of  her  alley,  and  diverting  her  at  parting 
by  the  exhibition  of  his  skill  in  a  sailor's  hornpipe, 
which  was  intended  to  impress  upon  her,  by  an  il- 
lustration of  his  future  activities,  the  statement 
that  he  was  shortly  going  to  Southampton  to  pick 
up  a  friend's  yacht,  in  which  he  was  to  make  a 
cruise  to  the  Western  Highlands.  The  hauling  on 
imaginary  sheets,  scaling  of  ratlines,  and  constant 
readjustment  of  treacherous  garments  that  threat- 
ened an  embarrassing  descent,  were  presented  with 
a  breeziness  and  spirit  that  called  forth  audible 
commendation  from  certain  loafing  amateurs  and 
the  driver  of  the  cab,  wherein  D'Albiac  sat,  as- 
suming an  expression  of  indulgent  delight  that  was 
not  entirely  convincing.  Flora,  however,  enjoyed 


76     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

these  corybantic  exercises  whole-heartedly,  and 
when  Roddy  had  ceased,  from  exhaustion,  and 
tumbled  weakly  into  the  cab,  still  braying  with 
laughter  at  his  own  humour,  she  stood  at  the  en- 
trance to  the  court  to  see  them  off,  and  the  last 
vision  that  D'Albiac  had,  as  he  looked  back  to  lift 
his  hat  again,  -was  of  a  laughing  face  and  the  flut- 
ter of  a  small  hand. 

The  smile  and  the  flutter  pursued  him  through  the 
remainder  of  the  evening,  and  even,  to  his  great 
annoyance,  insinuated  themselves  into  the  sacred 
realm  of  his  dreams.  Ridiculously  he  felt,  in  the 
next  few  days,  that  such  an  invasion  of  his  in- 
most thoughts  was  almost  an  infidelity  to  Patrice. 
This  stupid  sense  of  guilt  refused  to  be  laughed 
away,  although  he  found  himself  insisting  to  his 
conscience,  with  the  most  laughable  gravity,  on  the 
very  obvious  fact  that  Flora  was  nothing  whatever 
to  him,  and  that  the  interest  he  had  felt  in  her 
had  been  awakened  purely  by  the  novelty  of  her 
character  and  manner;  indeed  by  what,  in  retro- 
spect, he  might  well  regard  as  her  defects.  "  Damn 
her !  "  he  said  to  himself,  over  and  over  again.  "  I 
won't  ever  go  near  her  again!  "  And  to  fortify  his 
resolution  he  haunted  his  betrothed's  home,  in  and 
out  of  season,  in  order  to  occupy  his  idle  fancies 
and  insure  them  against  any  further  extravagance. 
After  a  time,  however,  as  the  memory  of  the  after- 
noon at  Battersea  had  begun  to  blur  with  the  efflux 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     77 

of  time,  this  very  discipline  presented  itself  to  a 
busy  conscience  in  the  light  of  a  slight  on  his 
lover.  What  possible  danger  to  one  so  lovely  and 
beloved  could  lie  in  a  meeting  or  a  conversation 
with  any  other  woman  in  the  world,  more  especially 
with  a  person  of  the  stamp  of  Mrs.  Evans?  Was 
it  not  almost  a  duty  on  his  part  to  make  cold  and 
polite  visits  from  time  to  time  on  this  chance 
acquaintance,  merely  for  the  purpose  of  the  un- 
favourable comparison  with  true  beauty  and 
femininity,  and  a  triumphant  exposition  of  the  cold- 
ness of  his  heart  towards  any  but  its  own  mistress? 
Your  true  lover  exults  in  these  devout  exercises, 
and  Henry  D'Albiac  was  convinced,  in  all  the 
mapped  portions  of  his  mind,  that  it  was  such  feel- 
ings alone  that  induced  him,  after  a  decent  interval, 
sufficient  to  display  his  entire  indifference  to  her 
company,  to  contemplate  coolly  a  formal  visit  of 
tedious  social  convention  on  the  Chelsea  artist.  He 
was  certain  that  such  a  proceeding  would  be 
exactly  the  course  of  conduct  that  Patrice  would 
approve ;  although  he  had  never  actually  mentioned 
to  her  his  acquaintance  with  the  woman  in  ques- 
tion. Something  told  him  that  the  discussion  of  a 
personality  so  remote  and  unsympathetic  would  not 
be  welcome  to  the  almost  excessive  delicacy  of 
his  lover's  character;  nor,  he  said  stoutly,  with  a 
defiant  stare  into  the  slightly  mocking  eye  of  his 
conscience,  could  there  be  the  slightest  necessity 


78     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

for  keeping  her  informed  of  every  chance  acquaint- 
ance that  crossed  his  path.  She  was  the  last  per- 
son to  invite  such  jejune  and  pointless  confidences. 


IV 

JULY  had  come  with  a  burst  of  fierce  still  heat 
that  caused  the  rich  and  fashionable  world  to  con- 
sider seriously  the  possibilty  of  throwing  over  such 
social  engagements  as  yet  remained  to  be  fulfilled 
and  joining  a  sauve  qui  peut  in  flying,  fearfully 
panting  motors  and  trains  to  the  cool  depths  of  the 
country;  where  the  terraced  Italian  pleasaunces, 
spacious,  timbered  parks  and  sweet-smelling  Eng- 
lish rose-gardens,  guarded  by  blushing,  aged  walls 
or  trim-clipped  hedges,  offered  a  pleasant  vision  to 
those  who  were  beginning  to  feel  a  little  sated  with 
London  and  its  sacredly  exacting  social  duties;  a 
picture  of  lazy  days  in  the  shade  of  age-old  trees, 
or  by  tinkling  fountains;  luxurious  drifting  on  the 
bosom  of  glassy  lakes  and  deliberate,  lapping 
streams;  breathless  flights  in  swift  cars  along 
smooth  highroads,  through  deep  lanes  and  over 
wide  moors  and  rolling  downs;  and  the  agreeable 
clink  of  silver  and  china  as  the  tea-table  is  set  on 
the  balustraded  terrace  or  velvet  lawn,  while  the 
westering  sun  sets  the  diamond-faceted  windows  in 
a  flame,  or  adds  a  warm  gilding  to  the  sober  grey 
of  stone  walls  and  battlements,  and  the  sound  of 
distant  cries  and  laughter  from  the  tennis-ground 
comes  as  musically  to  the  ear  as  the  silken  rustle 

79 


8o     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

of  dresses  passing  rhythmically  up  and  down  the 
close-shaved  grass,  where  the  chatelaine  and  her 
guests  loiter  in  a  cool  evening  stroll  after  the 
languor  of  the  day.  And  then  the  wonderful 
nights,  when  the  air  is  fresh  almost  to  chill,  after 
the  stuffy  airlessness  of  the  London  streets  and 
squares ;  and,  in  place  of  the  almost  unbroken  rattle 
and  roar  of  traffic,  comes  the  utter,  holy  stillness 
of  the  country-side,  varied  only  by  the  whisper  of 
a  stealthy  breeze  among  the  full-leafed  trees,  the 
timid  tapping  of  weak  fingers  of  creeping  plants 
at  the  open  window,  or  perhaps  the  cry  of  some 
wakeful  bird  from  a  neighbouring  wood  or  the 
voluptuous  snoring  of  owls  among  the  ivy  of  the 
mantled  walls.  Above  all,  a  sky  of  dark,  polished 
steel,  sown  with  friendly,  golden  sentinels ;  drowned 
in  the  silver  tears •  of  the  melancholy  moon;  or  al- 
ternately veiled  and  bared  by  the  ghostly  pomp  of 
passing  cloud-wrack. 

The  Beaufoys  had  gone;  they  were  in  Wilt- 
shire, at  Beaufoy,  their  wonderful  old  family  seat, 
with  its  four  hoary,  crenellated  towers,  its  dappled 
greensward  park,  stubborn  oaks,  soaring  elms  and 
daintily  tripping  deer.  Roddy  Chalmers  was 
worrying  a  nearly  exhausted  yachting  party  with 
his  ceaseless  tricks  and  noise,  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  Arran.  Mr.  Colman  was  writhing  in  a  draw- 
ing-room in  Lincolnshire,  with  the  immediate  pros- 
pect of  transferring  his  serpentry  to  Beaufoy;  for 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     81 

Colman's  invitations,  though  numerous,  were 
usually  for  brief  periods.  In  fact  there  was  hardly 
a  soul  in  London;  the  deserted  city  being  inhabited 
only  by  that  portion  of  its  population  which  is 
obliged  to  work ;  or  which  the  absence  of  deer  parks 
and  Italian  gardens,  or  the  means  to  provide  even 
the  humblest  substitutes  for  them,  confines  per- 
manently to  the  town.  In  this  howling  wilderness 
—  howling  indeed,  by  night  and  day  —  the  unfor- 
tunate Henry  D'  Albiac  found  himself  at  what  is 
known  as  "  a  loose  end  "  about  the  middle  of  the 
month.  At  the  beginning  of  September  he  was 
due  at  Beaufoy;  meanwhile  it  was  always  possible 
for  him  to  amuse  himself  elsewhere  of  course  at 
his  own  expense;  or  no  doubt  he  might,  had  he  so 
chosen,  have  obtained  an  intermediate  invitation  to 
a  country  house.  The  fact  remains  that  he  was 
still  a  prisoner  in  the  sweltering  streets,  and  had 
found  an  occupation  for  himself,  during  the  period 
of  waiting  for  his  visit  to  Patrice,  in  carrying  out  a 
scheme  for  providing  a  little  surprise  for  her,  which, 
he  told  himself,  she  would  be  sure  to  appreciate 
highly;  to  secure  which  end  he  was  unselfishly  will- 
ing to  undergo  any  amount  of  tedium  and  con- 
straint. 

Beneath  the  dry  light  of  the  northern  windows, 
therefore,  D' Albiac  was  sitting,  for  the  third  or 
fourth  time,  in  this  dutiful  bondage,  one  brilliant 
morning,  while  Flora  Evans,  in  a  long  holland 


82     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

blouse,  transferred  his  handsome  features  to  the 
canvas  that  stood  on  the  easel  before  him.  Henry 
appeared  to  be  bearing  up  bravely  against  his  en- 
forced captivity,  for  he  had  been  talking  and  laugh- 
ing gaily  enough  to  the  artist,  who,  in  the  more  si- 
lent mood  induced  by  painting,  had  answered  prin- 
cipally in  monosyllables  or  brief  phrases,  as  she 
stepped  backwards  and  forwards  from  her  easel, 
tilting  her  head  from  side  to  side  to  contemplate 
her  own  work;  sometimes  only  applying  a  single 
touch  at  a  time  for  several  minutes;  at  other  times 
painting  in  vigorous  silence,  without  moving  from 
her  place,  for  a  longer  period.  In  one  of  the  inter- 
vals provided  by  her  retreating  from  the  canvas  to 
judge  the  effect  of  a  minute  or  two  of  brush-work, 
Henry  seized  the  opportunity  to  enquire  about  the 
hopefulness  of  its  prospects. 

"  Going  to  be  a  success  ?  " 

Flora,  whose  inclined  head  and  rough  hair,  to- 
gether with  the  long  paint  brush  held  by  the  mid- 
dle in  her  mouth,  made  her  appearance  irresistibly 
suggestive  of  a  little  dog  carrying  a  stick,  looked 
up  at  him  thoughtfully,  and  took  the  brush  from  be- 
tween her  lips. 

"  I  don't  think  it's  bad,  so  far.  It  won't  be  quite 
as  good  as  Velasquez,  but  on  the  other  hand  it  will 

be  better  than  ."  She  added  the  name  of  a 

celebrated  portrait  painter,  whose  works  occupy  so 
much  space  on  the  line  at  the  Royal  Academy  and 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     83 

command  such  princely  prices  that  it  may  be  con- 
cluded she  was  speaking  only  in  jest.  D'Albiac 
laughed  in  a  non-committal  manner;  for,  after  all, 
he  knew  that  artists  are  apt  to  see  their  own  work 
a  little  out  of  perspective. 

"  I'm  afraid  the  subject  isn't  very  inspiring,"  he 
suggested,  with  obvious  insincerity ;  for  he  was  per- 
fectly aware  that  his  appearance  was  rather  un- 
usually pleasing.  "  It  would  have  been  better  if 
I  had  asked  you  to  paint  Miss  Beaufoy's  portrait 
for  me,  instead  of  mine  for  her.  But  of  course 
she's  been  done  over  and  over  again  by — "  He 
had  nearly  added  "  real  artists,"  before,  with  a 
snap  of  the  teeth  that  almost  hurt  him,  he  succeeded 
in  securing  the  escaping  words.  Flora  did  not  ap- 
pear to  notice  his  embarrassment. 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know,"  she  said  thoughtfully,  bend- 
ing forward  to  peer  into  the  picture  at  close  quar- 
ters. "  You've  got  quite  a  good  face  for  a  por- 
trait. Of  course  plastering  your  hair  down  tight 
all  over  your  head  like  that,  and  wearing  a  hard, 
high  collar  doesn't  give  you  much  chance  of  look- 
ing very  nice,  does  it?  Still,  you're  interesting  to 
paint.  Do  you  know  Karel  du  Jardin's  portrait 
of  a  young  man  with  curls,  in  the  National  Gal- 
lery?" 

D'Albiac  shook  his  head,  feeling  slightly  huffed 
at  her  criticism  of  his  undeniably  smart  appearance. 

"  Go  and  look  at  it.     Oh,  if  I  could  paint  like 


84     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

that!  But  I  was  going  to  say,  you're  astonish- 
ingly like  that  boy.  If  you  let  your  moustache  and 
hair  grow,  and  were  allowed  to  wear  nice  things, 
you  really  might  almost  be  him;  except  that  he 
looks  more  dissipated;  not  so  innocent  as  you." 

"Do  I  look  innocent?"  enquired  Henry  with 
rather  a  vexed  laugh.  It  was  a  word  that  he  did 
not  much  like  in  connexion  with  himself  and  the 
disillusioned  worldliness  that  he  had  acquired  from 
his  experiences. 

"  Yes,  I  think  on  the  whole  you  do,"  she  said, 
regarding  him  contemplatively.  "  No  doubt  you've 
done  lots  of  stupid,  ugly  things ;  and  perhaps  a  cer- 
tain number  of  cruel  ones.  Men  nearly  always  do. 
But  fundamentally,  by  inclination,  you  look  to  me 
harmless  and  kind.  If  you  cared  to  try,  you  could 
probably  be  some  use  in  the  world." 

"  Dear  me !  The  conversation's  becoming  very 
improving,"  he  laughed. 

"  Isn't  it  ? "  she  agreed,  painting  away  busily. 
"  You'd  much  rather  believe  you  were  a  danger- 
ous, wicked  person,  I  know.  Well,  perhaps  you'll 
succeed  in  becoming  one  in  time,  if  you  stick  to  it 
and  try  hard.  It's  quite  a  common  form  of  suc- 
cess. Keep  your  head  quite  still  a  moment  —  no, 
just  as  it  was  before,  please.  And  tell  me  some- 
thing that  doesn't  want  answering  for  a  minute  or 
two." 

"What  shall  I  tell  you?"  he  asked,  half-con- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     85 

sciously  admiring  the  play  of  colour  in  the  artist's 
fair  skin  as  she  worked  with  a  suddenly  renewed 
energy.  Despite  her  obvious  entire  absence  of  shy- 
ness in  all  circumstances,  Flora  blushed  frequently 
with  a  flowery  brightness,  the  gay  colour  sweeping 
transitorily  and  unexpectedly  over  her  cheeks  and 
even  bordering  on  the  porcelain  whiteness  of  her 
long,  slender  neck.  Generally  it  was  interest,  sur- 
prise or  enthusiasm  that  ran  up  this  attractive  sig- 
nal flag,  and  it  was  a  fascinating  addition  to  the 
sparkle  of  her  eyes  on  these  occasions  and  the  swift, 
soft,  tumbling  freshets  of  her  speech.  She  paused 
for  a  moment  in  her  occupation,  and  looked  up  at 
him,  cool  again  as  a  pale  pink  rose. 

"  Tell  me  about  your  betrothed,"  she  said. 
"  Who  is  she  ?  I  only  know  her  name.  She's 
pretty,  of  course?" 

Henry  paused  for  a  moment  to  let  the  vision  of 
his  lover  rise  before  his  eyes  and  gloriously  eclipse 
the  physical  presence  of  the  untidy  little  artist. 
Tall,  lithe,  flaming-haired,  pale  and  full-lipped,  she 
stood  before  his  mind's  eye  in  the  wonderful 
dresses  that  her  matchless  taste  and  riches  per- 
mitted her  always  to  affect,  and  smiled  lovingly  upon 
him,  with  that  languorous,  extramundane  grace 
that  enslaved  and  enraptured  him. 

"  Yes,"  he  said  simply.  "  You  would  love  to 
paint  her.  She  has  the  most  wonderful  hair,  like 
polished  copper.  Perhaps  you  saw  her  portrait  in 


86     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

the  Academy  the  year  before  last?  Barber  said 
her  hands  were  the  most  beautiful  he  had  ever 
painted.  She's  tall  and  she  dresses  —  artistically, 
you  know;  not  just  following  the  fashions.  She 
designs  all  her  own  clothes.  The  Beaufoys  live 
down  in  Wiltshire ;  the  father  died  years  ago.  Mrs. 
Beaufoy  was  a  great  beauty,  too,  I  believe. 
They're  rather  a  —  rather  a  distinguished  family." 

He  paused,  feeling  that  he  was  likely  to  become 
vicariously  boastful. 

"  Oh?  "  said  Flora  interrogatively,  without  look- 
ing up.  "What  for?" 

"  Well,  it  was  a  Beaufoy  who  was  beside  the 
Conqueror  when  he  landed,  you  know." 

"What  conqueror  was  that?"  asked  the  artist, 
with  a  calm  seriousness  that  caused  Henry  to  stare 
at  her  for  a  moment  in  silence,  before  replying, 
with  a  natural  indulgence  of  tone: 

"William  the  First  —  the  Duke  of  Normandy." 

There  were  times  when  her  ignorance  surprised 
him;  apparently  well  educated  on  the  whole,  she 
was  yet  often  unfamiliar  with  the  simplest  and  most 
generally  known  matters. 

"  Oh,  yes !  Ten  sixty-six,"  she  replied,  busy 
with  her  work. 

"  The  story  goes,"  continued  Henry,  warming  to 
his  subject,  "  that  when  William  stumbled  on  land- 
ing, he  helped  him  to  his  feet." 

"  That  was  very  polite  of  him  —  for  those  days," 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     87 

said  Flora  approvingly.  "  Was  that  the  last  thing 
the  family  did?" 

D'Albiac  smiled  privately  at  her  obtuseness. 

"  Hardly !  I  only  told  you  that  to  give  you  an 
idea  of  the  long  way  their  history  goes  back. 
They've  been  great  landowners  ever  since.  Hugh 
de  Beaufoy  received  large  grants  of  land  from  Ru- 
fus." 

"  I  see.     They're  rich,"  said  Flora,  apathetically. 

Although  he  could  not  have  said  that  the  tone  in 
which  she  spoke  was  actually  disparaging,  yet  she 
did  not  appear  sufficiently  impressed  to  please  him 
altogether. 

"  I  think  perhaps  you  don't  consider  it  alto- 
gether a  distinction  to  have  been  one  of  the  great 
landed  families  throughout  all  the  history  of  Eng- 
land," he  suggested,  with  a  touch  of  scorn  in  his 
voice. 

"  Oh,  well,"  answered  Flora  off-handedly,  push- 
ing the  end  of  her  small,  pink  thumb  against  the 
canvas  and  rubbing  it  upwards,  "  it  shows  a  certain 
amount  of  adhesiveness,  of  course.  By  itself  it 
doesn't  mean  much,  does  it?  But  no  doubt  the 
Beaufoys  have  done  more  than  stick  to  their  prop- 
erty; public  services  of  some  kind." 

Henry  would  have  been  glad  to  thrash  out  the 
point  of  the  respectability  of  ancient  lineage  per  se, 
but  he  had  for  some  time  been  aware  that  the  ar- 
tist belonged  to  that  half -educated  modern  class 


88     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

whose  members  are  devoid  of  reverence  for  much 
that  is  truly  honourable,  and  obstinate  against  con- 
version; being  rooted  in  the  assertive  proposition 
that  they  are  as  good  as  their  betters.  He  had  no 
wish  to  start  a  perfectly  useless  quarrel  with  Flora, 
for  whom,  in  spite  of  their  naturally  different  points 
of  view,  he  had  begun  to  feel  a  genuine  friend- 
ship; so  he  strove  to  think  of  some  more  common- 
place distinction  in  the  Beaufoy  family  that  would 
be  more  likely  to  appeal  to  her  mind. 

"  Oh,  no  doubt,"  he  said,  after  a  barren  exam- 
ination of  his  memory.  "  I  believe  there  have  been 
lots  of  soldiers  and  politicians  in  the  direct  line. 
The  son  of  the  house  to-day  —  Ivan  —  is  in  the 
Blues,"  he  added,  with  a  touch  of  legitimate  pride 
at  referring  to  the  famous  regiment. 

"  Always  ? "  enquired  Mrs.  Evans,  with  quick 
sympathy. 

"Always?"  repeated  Henry  fretfully.  "Al- 
ways? Yes,  of  course.  That's  to  say,  he's  served 
now  for  four  or  five  years,  I  believe.  He's  a  lieu- 
tenant." 

"  Of  course.  Stupid !  "  she  murmured  apologet- 
ically. "  And  he's  a  great  friend  of  yours,  I  sup- 
pose?" 

"  Yes  —  oh,  yes !  "  Henry  said  unconvincingly ; 
for  in  sober  truth,  he  could  scarcely  endure  the 
tedium  of  his  future  brother's  society;  and  he 
smiled  a  little  as  he  continued.  "  He's  quite  a  good 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     89 

fellow;  liked  by  his  brother  officers,  and  all  that. 
Not  particularly  clever,  I  think." 

"  Dear  me !  "  said  Flora,  with  a  concerned  ex- 
pression of  face.  "  That'll  be  a  great  disadvantage 
to  him  in  the  Horse  Guards,  won't  it?  " 

"  Oh,  no,  I  don't  think  it  matters  very  much," 
Henry  replied  comfortably.  "  It's  not  a  working 
regiment,  you  know.  If  a  fellow's  smart  and  pop- 
ular, that's  the  main  thing.  And  Ivan's  a  thorough 
good  sportsman." 

"  What  does  he  do?     Play  cricket?  " 

"  I  don't  think  so.  He  shoots,  of  course ;  I  don't 
know  if  he's  a  good  shot  or  not;  as  I  don't  happen 
to  have  been  at  a  shoot  with  him  yet.  But  he  runs 
a  couple  of  big  motors;  and  he's  awfully  fond  of 
racing." 

"  Gambling?  "  asked  Flora,  with  her  head  on  one 
side. 

D'Albiac  laughed.  "  You  said  that  quite  like 
his  mother,"  he  replied  good-humouredly.  "  It's 
funny  how  most  women  hate  betting." 

"  Well,  it  generally  has  to  be  paid  out  of  the 
housekeeping  money,  I  suppose,"  Flora  argued. 
"  Are  you  fond  of  it  ?  " 

"  Not  immoderately,"  he  replied,  with  a  sugges- 
tion in  his  tones  of  the  possibility  of  lurid  tales  of 
wild  pluck  at  the  game,  if  he  chose  to  boast.  "  I 
play  when  I'm  at  Monte  Carlo,  of  course  —  and 
then  there's  bridge;  and  Ascot  and  Goodwood. 


90     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

But  you  needn't  be  afraid  of  hearing  of  my  ruin." 

"  As  far  as  that  goes,"  said  Flora,  squeezing  the 
last  residue  of  the  paint  out  of  the  tube  on  to  her 
palette,  "  the  sooner  an  unmarried  gambler's  ruined 
the  better.  Then  he  can't  play  these  baby  games 
any  longer,  and  has  to  work  or  starve." 

She  spoke  without  the  slightest  heat;  but  Henry 
remembered,  with  a  covert  smile,  that  this  was  too 
often  delicate  ground  in  talking  to  a  woman. 
Sport  of  that  kind  did  not  always  appeal  to  them 
strongly;  and  it  seemed  expedient  to  vary  the  sub- 
ject. 

"  I  go  down  to  Beaufoy  next  week,"  he  began, 
after  a  considerable  pause,  during  which  Flora  had 
contemplated  his  face  with  an  almost  embarrassing 
gravity  and  intensity. 

"  Your  nose  bends  to  the  left,"  she  replied  ir- 
relevantly, in  the  matter-of-fact  tones  of  one  giv- 
ing interesting  information.  Henry's  hand  flew  to 
the  criticised  member  to  straighten  it,  and  he  was 
conscious  of  blushing  hotly;  for  his  appearance  was 
dear  to  him.  The  artist  meanwhile,  having  settled 
the  point  to  her  satisfaction,  turned  her  eyes  back 
to  her  canvas,  and  compared  the  painting  with  the 
original  thoughtfully. 

"I  beg  your  pardon;  what  were  you  saying?" 
she  added  politely,  after  a  time,  realising  the  si- 
lence that  had  fallen. 

"  No,  but  I  say,  Mrs.  Evans  —  it  doesn't  really?  " 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     91 

protested  Henry,  anxiously  and  vainly  looking 
about  for  a  mirror,  and  convinced  that  this  defect 
must  have  arisen  since  he  shaved  that  morning; 
for  he  had  noticed  nothing  wrong  then,  although 
he  had,  as  usual,  scrutinised  himself  with  loving 
care. 

"  What  ?  Oh,  your  nose !  "  she  said,  looking  at 
him  with  a  vague  eye,  and  then  suddenly  smiling, 
with  a  touch  of  impishness.  "  Yes.  Never  mind ; 
hardly  anybody's  nose  is  quite  straight.  You  don't 
see  it  till  you  come  to  paint  them.  Where  did  you 
say  you  were  going?" 

"  To  Beaufoy,"  he  said  sulkily.  Why  couldn't 
she  leave  his  nose  alone  ?  he  thought  resentfully ;  he 
could  never  feel  the  same  confidence  again  after 
this ;  the  idea  that  people  were  regarding  the  sinister 
diversion  of  the  feature  would  haunt  him,  when- 
ever he  caught  the  eye  of  an  acquaintance  fixed  on 
his  face  with  that  interested  expression  that  he  had 
often  noticed.  No  doubt  it  was  often  his  absurd 
deformity  that  caused  the  interest.  Flora  mean- 
while seemed  unconscious  of  her  offence,  and  was 
painting  again  calmly. 

"Beaufoy  is  the  name  of  their  place,  is  it?  Is 
it  very  beautiful?  " 

"  Yes ;  the  park's  lovely  and  the  house,  or  rather 
castle,  is  most  interesting  —  at  least  to  me,"  he  said 
with  intention.  "  Though  I  suppose  not  to  people 
who  are  not  interested  in  old  families." 


92     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"Everything's  interesting,  don't  you  think?" 
asked  Flora,  amiably.  "  And  history  and  antiqui- 
ties are  thrilling;  though  they're  very  often  chiefly 
a  record  of  atrocious  wickedness.  I  should  love  to 
see  the  house;  I've  a  passion  for  old  buildings. 
Are  there  any  pictures  ?  " 

"  Unfortunately,  no.  The  grandfather  —  I  think 
it  was  —  sold  and  gave  away  nearly  everything  in 
the  house;  though  he  had  no  power  to  do  so.  It 
was  practically  stealing.  Previously,  I  believe, 
they  had  one  of  the  finest  private  collections  in  Eng- 
land." 

"  Oh,  well ;  they're  probably  in  public  galleries 
by  this  time,"  said  Flora  consolingly,  "  and  that's 
the  proper  place  for  them,  isn't  it?  Why  aren't 
you  down  there  now?  I  should  have  thought  this 
weather  would  have  been  ideal  for  staying  at  a 
place  like  that." 

"Miss  Beaufoy's  away;  and  I  don't  care  to  be 
there  without  her,"  he  explained.  "  She's  up  north 
with  the  Wirksworths;  had  to  go,  as  she  was  spe- 
cially asked  to  meet  Princess  Betsey." 

"Who's  she?     A  Pole?"  enquired  Flora. 

"  Pole  ?  No,  no.  Princess  Elizabeth  of  Mun- 
ster,  you  know.  Why  a  Pole,  for  goodness' 
sake?" 

"  I  don't  know ;  it  sounded  — .  She's  some  sort 
of  relation  to  our  royal  family,  isn't  she?  Is  she 
young  or  old  ?  " 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     93 

"  Quite  young.  Oh,  but  you  must  have  read 
about  her  —  seen  pictures  of  her  in  the  papers, 
over  and  over  again.  She's  a  dear !  " 

Flora  shook  her  head  disapprovingly. 

"  You  seem  to  me  to  be  on  intimate  terms  with 
too  many  dears,"  she  said,  looking  at  him  with 
solemn  eyes. 

"  I  ?  I  don't  know  her  at  all.  I  mean  she's 
very  pretty  and  smart.  She's  taken  a  great  fancy 
to  Patrice  —  to  Miss  Beauf oy ;  but  personally  I've 
never  met  her." 

"  Oh,  I  see,"  said  Flora,  with  a  slightly  puzzled 
inflection.  "  I  thought  you  called  her  some  pet 
name — Topsy  or  something." 

"  Betsy  ?  Everybody  calls  her  that,"  laughed 
D'Albiac.  "  She's  quite  a  pet  of  the  public  and 
the  newspapers." 

"  Fancy !  "  Flora  ejaculated,  with  a  toneless  dul- 
ness.  "  And  when  do  you  go  to  the  country?  " 

"  At  the  end  of  the  month,  or  the  beginning  of 
the  next;  for  the  partridges.  They  have  splendid 
shooting  down  there ;  young  Ivan  has  been  particu- 
larly careful  about  the  pheasants,  though  he's  had 
a  lot  of  difficulties  with  the  poachers.  It's  a  bad 
part  of  the  country  for  poaching.  Unfortunately 
I  shan't  be  able  to  be  there  for  the  pheasant  shoot- 
ing, as  I  rashly  booked  myself  to  go  to  Norfolk  in 
October,  where  the  sport's  nothing  like  as  good,  I 
believe." 


94     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

He  paused,  with  that  uncertain  suspicion  that  he 
was  not  receiving  proper  attention,  of  which  one  is 
often  conscious,  although  there  is  no  visible  or 
audible  cause  for  the  belief;  and  hoped  that  some 
question  as  to  his  fondness  for  the  sport  would 
give  him  an  opportunity  of  hinting  at  his  prowess; 
for,  like  most  young  men,  he  had  an  innocent  and 
natural  vanity  in  his  virile  accomplishments,  and 
would  have  liked  to  be  able  to  suggest  to  this  unad- 
miring  feminine  friend  that  he  had  acquired  a  wide- 
spread reputation  for  holding  a  gun  straight.  Mrs. 
Evans  was,  however,  describing  circles  with  her 
thumb  round  one  of  the  painted  eyes,  and  seemed 
unconscious  that  he  had  ceased  speaking. 

"  However,  there'll  be  some  pretty  good  guns 
there,"  he  continued  in  a  rather  louder  tone. 
"  Wymondham  himself,  that's  my  host,  is  one  of 
the  three  or  four  best  shots  in  England ;  and  there'll 
be  George  Ross  and  a  West  Country  fellow  — 
Trecothick  —  I  don't  know  him,  but  he's  said  to 
be  pretty  good.  But  perhaps  you're  not  much  in- 
terested in  shooting,"  he  concluded  rather  lamely, 
chilled  by  her  unmoved  demeanour. 

She  shook  her  head  without  looking  at  him. 

"  Not  a  bit,"  she  said  frankly. 

D'Albiac  was  as  sensitive  as  most  sporting 
devotees  to  a  certain  odiously  supercilious  tone  on 
the  part  of  the  opponents  of  honest  British  amuse- 
ments ;  and  studiously  level  as  Flora's  voice  was,  he 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     95 

detected  the  enemy  in  it,  and  flung  back  a  chal- 
lenging phrase. 

"  Why  not  ?  I  thought  you  said  everything  was 
interesting?  " 

She  looked  at  him  thoughtfully,  pushing;  back 
her  hair  from  her  face  with  the  handle  of  a  brush. 

"Did  I?  Well,  I  meant  it.  What  I  should 
say  about  shooting  is,  that  I'm  not  agreeably  inter- 
ested in  it.  Of  course,  I  should  be  very  much  in- 
terested in  doing  away  with  it,  if  I  saw  any  present 
chance  of  that." 

Henry  reddened;  his  landowner's  feelings  were 
stirred  to  their  depths. 

"  I  suppose,"  he  said,  laughing  bitterly,  "  that 
it's  the  wicked  game  laws,  and  the  '  pore '  man  that 
upsets  you.  Perhaps  you  don't  know  that  if  it 
hadn't  been  for  the  preserving  of  game  there 
wouldn't  by  this  time  have  been  a  single  bird — " 

"  Yes,  I  know  all  about  that,"  said  Flora,  uncon- 
cernedly. "  That's  one  of  the  things  I  principally 
object  to  in  preserving.  As  for  poachers,  I'm 
afraid  a  charge  of  shot  out  of  their  guns  isn't  any 
nicer  than  one  out  of  yours.  Still,  there  is  this  to 
be  said  for  them,  that  it's  generally  want  of  food 
that  drives  them  to  shoot.  But  to  do  it  just  for  fun 
is  —  well,  to  me,  you  know,  it's  revolting." 

"  I  see,"  he  said  humorously,  but  with  a  flushed 
face.  "  It's  the  poor  dear  dicky-birds  that  you're 
worried  about." 


96     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  That's  it,"  said  Mrs.  Evans,  in  her  soft,  pleas- 
ant voice;  painting  again  now,  with  frequent  small 
pauses  to  criticise  her  own  work.  "  If  you  want  to 
show  how  cleverly  you  can  shoot,  there  are  arti- 
ficial things  —  aren't  there?  —  which  can  be  made 
to  give  much  harder  shots  —  any  degree  of  hard- 
ness up  to  impossibility.  To  want  to  hurt  live 
creatures  is  just  a  stupid  conventional  survival  of 
the  savage's  delight  in  cruelty,  which  most  shoot- 
ers—  you,  for  instance  —  haven't  even  got  now- 
adays to  excuse  your  proceedings." 

D'Albiac  had  the  German  national  characteris- 
tic, referred  to  by  Schopenhauer,  nearly  as 
strongly  developed  as  the  one  attributed  to  the 
French  by  the  same  philosopher.  It  was  almost  as 
unbearable  an  insult  to  him  to  be  called  a  fool  as  a 
coward;  and  he  looked  about  angrily  for  some 
crushingly  logical  retort  to  this  humanitarian  clap- 
trap. 

"  Game's  an  article  of  food  — "  he  began, 
hotly. 

"  But  it's  not  with  the  idea  of  providing  food 
that  you  go  shooting,  is  it?  Or  hunting  foxes?" 
Flora  asked,  with  an  infuriatingly  innocent  impu- 
dence in  her  raised  eyebrows. 

"  We  weren't  talking  about  foxes,"  he  objected. 
"  And  if  you're  so  concerned  about  hurting  a  bird 
or  two,  I  should  have  thought  you'd  have-  cried 
daily  over  your  mutton  chop.  If  it's  revolting  to 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     97 

shoot  a  partridge,  it's  revolting  to  pole-axe  an  ox 
or  to  hang  up  a  calf  by  the  heels  — " 

He  paused  with  an  effort,  feeling  that  his  tone, 
in  face  of  her  immovable  good  temper,  was  becom- 
ing a  little  rough ;  though  the  words  "  revolting  " 
and  "  stupid  "  stuck  in  his  gullet,  increasing  in  in- 
digestibility  as  the  soft,  half  interrogative  tone  in 
which  they  had  been  uttered  faded  from  the  mem- 
ory. 

"  Isn't  it  ?  "  agreed  the  artist  heartily.  "  Abso- 
lutely revolting,  as  you  say.  Although  it's  rather 
more  excusable,  because  people,  in  the  face  of  over- 
whelming evidence  to  the  contrary,  still  genuinely 
believe  that  it's  necessary  for  human  beings  to  eat 
meat.  But  don't  talk  about  my  mutton  chop, 
please.  I  haven't  eaten  such  a  thing  since  I  was 
allowed  to  feed  as  I  liked,  instead  of  as  I  was  told." 

D'Albiac  shifted  uncomfortably  in  his  chair;  he 
had  no  wish  to  get  into  an  argument  with  a  food- 
faddist  ;  for  he  had  suffered  already  in  society  from 
certain  hypochondriacal  bores,  who  dismally  prated 
of  their  systems  of  diet  and  their  own  digestive 
disabilities;  blighting  happy  parties  and  annihilat- 
ing conversation  with  strange  and  too  often  impu- 
dent figures  of  speech,  in  which  such  esoteric  words 
as  "  proteids,"  "  albuminoids,"  "  metabolism  "  and 
"  pultaceous  "  constantly  recurred.  He  waved  his 
hand  conclusively. 

"  Oh,  if  you  live  on  grass,  I've  no  more  to  say," 


98 

he  said  lightly,  "  except  that  it  wouldn't  suit  me." 

"  How  long  a  trial  did  you  give  it  ?  Very  often 
there's  a  sort  of  false  feeling  of  weakness  at  first 
you  know,"  suggested  Flora  persistently. 

"  I  haven't  tried ;  and  pardon  me  saying  so,  but 
I  don't  want  to  talk  of  these  things,"  he  said  stiffly, 
to  stop  the  discussion  once  and  for  all.  "  The 
world  is  full  of  horrible  things.  It  does  no  good  to 
think  of  them." 

"Oh,  yes;  but  it  does,"  Flora  maintained  with 
amiable  obstinacy,  pausing  in  her  work  and  look- 
ing at  him  over  a  rounded  shoulder,  with  an  air 
of  insinuation  that  she  had,  which  was  like  that  of 
some  pet  animal  making  tentative  advances  on  a 
stern  master.  "  One  must  think  of  everything  con- 
stantly." 

"  Curable  or  incurable  ?  "  he  retorted,  with  a  curl 
of  the  lip. 

"  I  don't  believe  anything's  incurable,"  answered 
Flora,  squaring  her  shoulders  drolly,  with  a  lift 
of  her  chin.  "  And  the  things  that  appear  to  be 
are  the  very  ones  to  be  kept  in  the  light  —  it's  their 
only  chance  of  being  cured.  But  here's  a  perfectly 
preventable  thing  that  it's  everyone's  duty  to  think 
about;  and  of  course  if  they  —  if  you  decide,  after 
consideration,  that  it's  to  go*  on,  it  must  go  on. 
But  it's  outrageous  to  let  such  things  be,  out  of 
cowardice  in  facing  them  or  mere  want  of  thought. 
Have  you  ever  been  to  a  slaughter-house  ?  " 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     99 

"  Certainly  not,"  he  said  snappily,  and  added 
with  cunning,  "have  you?" 

"  Well,  it  hasn't  been  necessary  for  me,  you  see," 
she  answered.  "  But  I'm  quite  sure,  from  what 
I've  been  told  of  them,  that  if  you  realised  what 
goes  on  there  —  if  you  had  to  take  part  in  it  your- 
self as  the  price  of  eating  meat,  you'ld  become  a 
vegetarian  this  moment." 

"  There  are  many  disgusting  trades  that  I 
couldn't  engage  in,"  said  Henry. 

"  There  shouldn't  be,  then.  We  haven't  any 
right  whatever  to  make  poverty  a  weapon  with 
which  to  force  people  to  do  things  we  wouldn't  do 
ourselves.  Mr.  D'Albiac,  I  don't  think  you  can  pic- 
ture the  class  that's  been  made  necessary  to  slaugh- 
ter animals  for  your  food.  Try  to  think  of  your- 
self armed  daily  with  a  pole-axe,  clumsily  destroy- 
ing these  terrified  creatures,  that  are  dragged  bel- 
lowing and  screaming  up  to  you  on  a  windlass; 
and  some  woman  you  are  fond  of  —  Miss  Beaufoy 
—  crouching  on  the  ground,  with  her  clothes 
soaked  in  blood,  cutting  up  the  carcasses,  almost 
before  the  life's  out  of  them — " 

D'Albiac  put  up  his  hands  to  his  ears  with  a 
genuine  feeling  of  nausea. 

"  If  you're  going  to  say  these  loathsome  things," 
he  cried  furiously,  "  I  shall  go.  I  won't  sit  here 
and  listen  to  such  —  such  disgusting  — " 

He  broke   off,   stammering  and   crimson,   while 


ioo     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

the  artist  contemplated  his  face  with  sympathetic 
gravity.  She  made  no  apology,  however,  for  hav- 
ing mentioned  such  beastliness. 

"  It  is  disgusting.  That's  just  what  I  want  you 
to  feel,"  she  agreed  after  a  pause.  "  So  disgusting 
that,  as  with  vivisection,  even  if  the  continuance 
or  health  of  our  race  really  depended  on  such  — 
such  hellish  things  —  which  isn't  so  —  it  would  be 
our  duty  to  make  up  our  minds  to  suffering  or  a 
decent  extermination.  A  civilised  person  ought  to 
prefer  death  and  sickness  to  systematic  cruelty." 

D'Albiac  made  one  despairing  effort  after  com- 
fort in  face  of  the  picture  she  had  put  in  his 
mind. 

"  There !  You  admit  yourself  that  death  isn't 
so  great  a  matter,"  he  cried.  "  These  wretched 
animals  must  die  some  time  or  other." 

"  Yes.  It's  not  so  much  death,"  said  Flora,  re- 
turning to  her  picture.  "  Though,  even  then,  the 
death  in  the  slaughter-house  is  a  horrible  one.  It's 
life;  the  unnecessary  birth  of  these  millions  of  un- 
happy creatures;  to  live  artificial  lives;  forbidden 
for  the  most  part  to  breed  or  to  roam  at  large; 
driven  and  beaten  and  penned  and  shipped  to  other 
countries  by  the  most  ignorant  and  brutal  part  of 
the  population,  just  for  this  one  purpose  of  furnish- 
ing dead  bodies  for  our  dinner-tables.  Life,  even 
free,  natural  life,  isn't  such  a  happy  thing  that  one 
wouldn't  think  a  good  many  times  before  designedly 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     101 

bringing  large,  unnecessary  races  into  the  world. 
But  such  a  life  as  this  — !  " 

The  aposiopesis  was  eloquent;  and  seemed  so  in- 
dicative of  a  firm  conviction  that  the  question  had 
only  one  side,  that  Henry  felt  a  renewal  of  his  ir- 
ritability, which  had  for  a  minute  yielded  to  the 
feeling  of  repulsion  induced  by  the  mental  picture 
of  his  beautiful,  delicate  lover  in  loathly  wise.  It 
found  vent  in  what  he  felt  to  be  rather  a  schoolboy 
taunt. 

"  Oh !  You  always  think  your  opinions  must 
be  right!" 

"  Why,  of  course  I  do,"  answered  Flora,  smil- 
ing. "  Don't  you  ?  Everyone  ought  to  think  so. 
Otherwise,  why  have  opinions?  But  I  quite  sym- 
pathise with  other  people  having  different  ones,  if 
they've  taken  the  trouble  to  make  them  for  them- 
selves. What  I  can't  bear  is  the  laziness  of  taking 
one's  views  of  life  entire  from  other  people  or 
books  or  religious  systems  or  newspapers,  without 
ever  making  any  effort  to  think  things  out  for  one- 
self." 

"Do  you  mean  that  I  do  that?"  he  asked,  with 
sarcastic  courtesy. 

"  I  suspect  you  do,  largely,"  she  said  with  brazen 
effrontery.  "  At  least  in  this  case  I'm  sure  I  hope 
so ;  and  believe  so,  too,  for  you've  got  a  soft-hearted 
face.  You're  quite  capable  of  thinking  for  your- 
self, I  know;  don't  think  I  mean  that  you're  not 


102     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

But  this  taking  things  for  granted  is  so  general; 
people  go  on  for  generations  with  some  abomina- 
tion, and  then  one  day  it  suddenly  strikes  them, 
'  Hullo !  this  is  cruel  and  unnecessary.  Don't  let's 
do  it  any  more  ' ;  and  there's  an  end  to  that." 

The  ruffled  feelings  of  Henry  were  still  apparent 
in  his  high  colour  and  knitted  brows,  as  Flora 
stopped  speaking  and  looked  innocently  on  him,  her 
lips  pursed  and  twisted  a  little  aside  in  her  drolly 
meditative  fashion. 

"  Now  we'd  better  take  non-contentious  busi- 
ness," she  said,  laughing.  "  I  can't  paint  you  with 
that  terrific  frown.  Miss  Beaufoy  would  be  quite 
alarmed." 

He  smiled  perfunctorily. 

"  I  suppose  you  flatter  yourself  you've  made  me 
angry,"  he  said  carelessly,  with  a  curling  lip. 

"  Just  a  little,"  replied  the  painter,  teasingly. 
"  But  so  you  were  at  your  first  sitting,  about  the 
Suffrage,  you  know.  And  yet,  the  time  but  one 
after,  you  reopened  the  subject  yourself,  and  prac- 
tically agreed  with  everything  I'd  said.  Oh,  you're 
a  most  open-minded  person  really;  you  only  want 
a  little  stimulation  to  make  you  throw  over  all  your 
most  cherished  fetishes." 

"  Politics  are  quite  a  different  matter ;  and  I 
never  pretended  that  I'd  considered  the  feminist 
question  much." 

"  There  you  are,  you  see,"  Flora  put  in.     "  And 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     103 

yet  you  had  the  strongest  views  on  it,  and  called 
us  the  most  unkind  and  cutting  things." 

"And  I'm  not  altogether  convinced  yet — "  he 
persisted,  and  broke  down,  for  there  was  something 
physically  exhausting  in  arguing  with  this  unan- 
noyable  person;  the  strain  put  on  a  rather  hot  tem- 
per which  was  not  accustomed  to  discipline  or  dis- 
respectful treatment  left  him  afterwards  quite  in 
a  condition  of  nervous  reaction.  Mrs.  Evans  only 
looked  at  him  with  sly  incredulity. 

"  Don't  let's  begin  again  on  that,"  she  pleaded 
humbly.  "  Go  home  and  think  about  it  once  more, 
privately.  You're  one  of  those  people  who  rightly 
object  to  sermons,  but  are  thrown  by  hints  into 
spiritual  wrestlings,  as  ministers  say,  from  which 
you  emerge  transformed.  It's  only  necessary  to 
make  you  feel  uncomfortable;  to  put  the  roseleaf 
under  your  blankets ;  or  to  prick  you  with  the  hypo- 
dermic syringe;  and,  like  Kodak,  you  do  the  rest." 

"  I  wish  you  wouldn't  laugh  at  me,"  he  cried,  in 
pathetic  appeal.  "  I  do  hate  to  be  lumped  together 
with  the  bourgeois  and  stupid  in  that  way." 

"  Stupid  ?  But  the  people  I  mean  are  the  salt 
of  the  earth,"  she  replied.  "  Those  whose  con- 
science is  always  after  them  like  the  Furies;  the 
convertible  —  the  reasonable  —  the  inconsistent. 
I  intended  it  as  the  highest  compliment,  I  assure 
you.  And  you  must  forgive  me,  you  know,  Mr. 
D'Albiac,"  she  went  on,  giving  him  her  bright  eyes 


104     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

with  a  transparent  good-fellowship  which  com- 
pleted his  surrender.  "  I  didn't  mean  to  begin  the 
subject;  but  you  would  challenge  my  opinion, 
wouldn't  you?  Of  course,  I  know  it's  odious  to 
be  preached  at  viva  voce;  and  I  do  try  to  compress 
my  sermons,  but  I  was  born  long-winded.  Scotch 
people  are,  though  you've  probably  been  brought  up 
to  believe  that  they  say  nothing,  except  an  occa- 
sional guttural  '  Hoots ! '  or  '  Eh,  sirs ! ' 

"  You're  not  Scotch  ?  "  he  said,  with  a  surprise 
which  set  Flora  laughing. 

"I  am  that;  I'm  from  Dumfries,"  she  replied, 
gaily,  with  a  new,  strange  intonation,  which  she 
immediately  discarded  again.  "  But  I  married  a 
Welshman  and  live  in  England,  so  that  I  may  be 
said  to  be  a  most  exhaustive  representative  of 
Great  Britain.  Don't  look  so  scared!  I  promise 
not  to  dance  over  swords,  or  appear  in  a  kilt  be- 
fore you.  Now  I've  shocked  you  again.  What  a 
prudish  race  the  French  are !  " 

Henry  laughingly  protested  against  the  indict- 
ment, but  Flora  was  off  on  a  career  of  teasing  that 
nothing  could  arrest;  and  although  he  had,  at  his 
first  meetings  with  her,  rather  resented  being,  as 
she  said,  "  ragged,"  he  had  already  come  to  take  it 
generally  in  good  part;  and  to  attempt  reprisals, 
which  were  not,  as  yet,  usually  successful.  Flora's 
conversation  partook  in  almost  equal  quantities  of 
vigorous  and,  too  often,  polemical  discussion  of 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     105 

ponderously  grave  subjects,  and  mere  light-hearted 
nonsense.  In  small  talk,  the  usual  pleasant  flow  of 
gossip  on  social  and  topical  trivialities,  which  had 
been  till  now  almost  his  entire  conversational  prov- 
ender, she  had  self-admittedly  no  skill ;  and  in  pe- 
riods of  its  exhibition  would  fall  into  meditative 
silences,  during  which  the  blue  lights  in  her  eyes 
were  economically  turned  off,  to  flash  up  again  in 
a  moment  at  a  sympathetic  touch.  Even  art,  a 
subject  which  he  had  felt  sure  would  be  safe  ground 
with  her,  had  not  been  so  far  productive  of  any 
great  interchange  of  ideas.  Flora  objected  to 
criticism,  in  its  ordinary  sense  of  pointing  out  one's 
personal  objections  to  an  art- work;  and  they  had 
found  no  great  common  enthusiasm  to  discuss, 
which,  according  to  her,  was  the  only  enjoyable  or 
profitable  form  of  art  discussion. 

"  What  earthly  purpose,"  she  asked,  "  could  be 
served  by  my  decrying  pictures  you  liked,  or  you 
sneering  at  my  favourite  books?  We  should  only 
be  depriving  each  other  of  a  pleasure,  without  sub- 
stituting another  for  it.  If,  in  our  self-conceit, 
we  think  the  other  one  has  a  taste  for  bad  art,  we 
ought  to  attempt  a  wily  insinuation  of  what  we 
think  good  art  instead.  If  we  learn  to  like  the 
good,  we  shall  give  up  the  bad  of  our  own  accord. 
But  until  we  really  like  Titian,  it's  much  better  we 
should  genuinely  like  Boucher  than  that  we  should 
like  nothing  at  all;  and  Titian  won't  become  dear 


106     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

to  us  merely  from  having  dinned  into  our  ears  that 
Boucher  is  cheap  —  that's  to  say,  if  he  is,  of  course. 
7  don't  say  so." 

So,  in,  many  matters  that  interested  D'Albiac, 
Flora  was  unsoundable,  although  in  his  desire  to 
display  to  her  the  exquisite  taste  and  attainments 
of  Patrice  he  had  made  one  or  two  efforts  to  turn 
the  conversation  on  to  the  famous  works  of  art  in 
which  his  betrothed  took  such  perennial  delight. 
In  these,  as  in  other  subjects,  he  was  often  sur- 
prised at  the  artist's  want  of  knowledge  of  things 
that  he  had  thought  familiar  to,  or  within  the  bow- 
ing acquaintanceship  of,  all  educated  persons;  al- 
though she  appeared  to  compensate  for  the  want 
of  these  agreeably  slight  intimacies  with  an  almost 
tiresomely  close  friendship  with  a  small  circle.  It 
might  possibly  be  well,  for  instance,  to  have  a  pic- 
ture-dealer's knowledge  of  Diirer's  etchings  and 
wood-cuts,  though  it  hardly  appeared  socially  neces- 
sary, or  even  desirable ;  but  for  any  cultivated  per- 
son to  say,  unabashedly  and  without  any  form  of 
excuse,  explanation,  or  promise  for  the  future,  that 
she  was  wholly  ignorant  of  "  Madama  Butterfly," 
and  almost  entirely  so  of  Bain  and  Lafcadio  Hearn, 
quite  took  away  D'Albiac's  breath. 

As  he  walked  back  eastward  along  the  Thames 
Embankment  this  hot  July  morning,  he  found  him- 
self, for  the  hundredth  time,  petulantly  asking 
what  it  was  in  this  very  ordinary-looking  woman's 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     107 

company  that  so  undoubtedly  appealed  to  him? 
They  disagreed  constantly;  she  had  the  unfailing 
knack,  as  she  had  said,  of  making  him  feel  uncom- 
fortable (to-day,  for  instance,  she  had  quite  spoilt 
his  lunch),  and  turning  his  thoughts  in  the  most 
unpleasant  directions;  of  sacrilegiously  undermin- 
ing ornate  and  venerable  edifices  of  belief,  and  lay- 
ing beneath  them  hideously  delicate  and  explosive 
engines,  which  a  touch  or  careless  movement 
might,  he  felt,  at  any  moment  discharge.  She 
talked  far  too  earnestly,  when  she  was  serious,  and 
often  on  subjects  that  are  better  ignored  in  our  so- 
cial relations;  downright  babyishly,  when  she  was 
frivolous,  with  hardly  more  shame  or  reticence  than 
that  zany  Roddy  Chalmers.  In  addition  to  this, 
she  was  in  fact  considerably,  and  in  manner  and 
experience  often  immeasurably,  his  elder;  produc- 
ing a  disagreeable  and  humiliating  impression, 
which  no  reassuring  examination  of  her  smooth, 
mutable  complexion,  and  bright  lips  and  eyes  quite 
removed.  And  yet  it  was  vain  to  try  to  persuade 
himself  that  it  was  purely  out  of  a  desire  to  obtain 
a  moderately  faithful  portrait  of  himself,  at  a 
"  rock-bottom "  price,  that  he  returned  three  or 
four  times  a  week  to  the  bare  studio  in  the  mean 
Chelsea  Street.  He  could  not  conceal  from  him- 
self the  disconcerting  fact  that  he  looked  forward 
to  these  occasions  with  a  quite  disproportionate 
eagerness;  and  that  his  longing  to  terminate  them 


io8     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

by  leaving  London  to  join  his  sweetheart  at  Beau- 
foy  was  by  no  means  so  strong  as  he  would  have 
wished  to  see  it,  even  with  every  allowance  for  a 
temperament,  such  as  his  own,  which  was  always 
more  concerned  with  the  immediate  than  with  the 
more  remote  future. 


YOUTH  is  proverbially  ductile,  and  the  French  en- 
thusiasm famously  inflammable,  more  especially 
perhaps  where  the  torch  is  applied  by  a  feminine 
hand.  A  modern  writer,  who  knows  his  country- 
men, doubtless,  has  said  that,  had  but  the  palest 
imitator  of  Saint  Jeanne  arisen  in  the  last  genera- 
tion, the  Prussians  would  have  been  swept  back  on 
Berlin,  Moltke  and  United  Germany  notwithstand- 
ing. However  that  may  be,  the  race  is  one  ever 
ready  for  an  ideal  or  a  cause ;  and  D'Albiac,  besides 
being  conspicuously  young,  concealed,  or  partly 
concealed,  an  incurably  recalcitrant  French  heart 
under  the  formally  folded  cloak  of  his  Britannic 
indifference.  During  the  loneliness  of  July  in  Lon- 
don, moreover,  he  had  more  opportunities  for  con- 
templation than  perhaps  ever  before  in  his  life ;  for 
he  was  by  nature  passionately  gregarious  and  sel- 
dom allowed  himself  to  be  thrown  even  momen- 
tarily on  his  own  society  for  his  amusement.  The 
chance  words  that  arose  in  his  morning  conversa- 
tion with  the  Chelsea  painter  served,  therefore,  as 
texts  for  hour-long  pulpitry  in  his  solitary  walks, 
arm-chair  loungings  at  a  deserted  club,  and  restless 
attendances  on  sleep  throughout  the  airless,  swelter- 
ing nights  in  Cowley  Street.  Nor  was  enthusiasm 

109 


no     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

his  sole  national  characteristic;  he  had  as  well,  al- 
though till  now  but  seldom  brought  into  use,  the 
Frenchman's  love  of  logical  thinking,  of  pursuing 
a  subject  to  its  conclusion,  and  scorning  loss  of 
scent  or  broken-wind  as  personal  disgraces ;  and  al- 
though he  believed  that  some  of  the  quarry  re- 
leased by  Flora  Evans  was  of  a  worthless  and 
malodorous  species,  he  was  not  able  to  prevent  a 
mind  enamoured  of  the  chase  from  raising  a  view 
halloo.  Vermin,  we  know,  gives  us  as  good  a  run 
for  our  money  as  an  antlered  stag;  and,  where  the 
scent  is  blind,  it  is  always  possible  that  we  may 
find  we  have  run  down  a  hart  where  we  looked  but 
for  a  fox. 

Flora  and  her  opinions,  at  all  events,  occupied  a 
disproportionate  portion  of  his  waking  mind  dur- 
ing these  weeks,  and  if  he  did  not  admit  that  she 
had  succeeded  in  disturbing  any  very  important  ar- 
ticles of  his  belief,  he  was  yet  suspiciously  tolerant 
of  views  to  which  he  still  believed  himself  in  strong 
personal  opposition.  His  valet  was  filled  with  un- 
expressed amazement  at  his  orders  to  exclude  the 
usual  gun-case  from  the  luggage  that  he  was  to 
take  down  by  train  to  Beaufoy  at  the  beginning  of 
September;  even  displaying  a  certain  unprecedented 
obtuseness  in  understanding  his  master's  plain 
words  on  the  subject,  which  provoked  a  fling  of 
impatience  from  Henry,  who  was  aware  of  a  lurk- 
ing sense  of  shame  in  issuing  these  strange  direc- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     in 

tions.  Guns  were  not  necessary  for  courtship,  he 
argued;  and  he  was  going  down  to  Wiltshire  to 
steep  himself  in  the  delights  of  Patrice's  company, 
not  to  trudge  interminably  over  muddy  fields,  blaz- 
ing away  at  a  number  of  miserable  birds  for  which 
he  had  no  use;  an  entertainment  for  boys  and  lout- 
ish country  squires,  whose  dull  brains  are  incapable 
of  imaginative  pleasures ;  hardly  worthy  of  a  grown 
and  intelligent  man;  least  of  all  during  the  theo- 
retically unrepeatable  time  of  courtship.  It  would 
be  a  tribute  to  his  lover  to  arrive,  on  such  a  sacro- 
sanct date  as  the  first  day  of  September,  at  a  house 
so  famous  for  its  shooting,  unarmed  with  those 
weapons  of  which  he  was  a  proven  master.  The 
sacrifice  would  surely  touch  her,  for  she  knew  him 
to  be,  almost  above  all  else,  a  devotee  of  English 
sport.  Images  of  wounded  birds,  regarded  by  him- 
self with  a  new-born,  maudlin  regret  for  the  use- 
lessness  of  their  sufferings,  he  pushed  roughly  back 
from  the  entrances  of  his  mind,  much  as  a  sturdy, 
Olympian  constable  resists  the  foolishly  ineffectual 
efforts  of  misguided,  dishevelled  women  —  the  sim- 
ile was  rejected  at  this  point  as  inept;  dishonour- 
ing, too,  to  the  sex  to  which  Patrice  gave  glory. 

There  was  rather  a  large  house  party  at  Beaufoy 
when  Henry  arrived,  of  whom  it  is  not  necessary 
to  mention  more  than  a  few.  The  Honourable 
Mr.  Colman  was  "  taking  "  the  place  for  a  week  on 
his  way  to  Wales,  where  another  hostess  awaited 


112     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

his  coming  without  any  unwholesome  excitement; 
pretty  Mrs.  Fedden  irradiated  the  gathering  with 
the  display  of  her  glistening  teeth  in  endless  smiles 
that  were  more  probatory  of  amiability  than  of 
mirth ;  while  a  big,  middle-aged  man  who  shot  with 
enviable  accuracy,  but  for  the  rest  wore  rather  a 
slinking  air,  as  of  one  whose  boxes  and  pockets  it 
would  perhaps  be  as  well  to  inspect  before  he  left 
the  house,  was  known  to  be  Mrs.  Fedden's  hus- 
band, although  he  appeared  to  hold  no  verbal  in- 
tercourse with  her,  or  indeed  anybody  else,  except 
in  relation  to  his  barest  necessities.  There  was 
also  present  Viscount  Honiton,  who,  as  Major  Col- 
lett,  had  for  many  years  failed  to  enjoy  that  wide 
popularity  to  which  it  was  now  generally  agreed 
his  generosity  and  inexhaustible  flow  of  strongly 
individual  speech  justly  entitled  him.  His  unex- 
pected accession  to  the  honours  of  the  head  of  the 
house,  through  the  successive  deaths  of  several  re- 
mote cousins,  had  of  course  brought  him  promi- 
nently into  public  notice ;  and,  once  there,  his  sound, 
old-fashioned  common  sense  and  nobly  authori- 
tative bearing  were  sufficient  to  ensure  his  position 
remaining  a  permanent  one.  It  was  acknowledged 
in  political  circles  that  the  debates  in  the  House  of 
Lords,  upon  military  matters  more  particularly, 
were  quite  a  different  thing  since  Honiton  took  his 
seat.  His  lady  wife  was  as  imposing  in  her  own 
way  as  the  Viscount  in  his;  a  golden-haired,  ma- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     113 

ture  woman  of  Titanic  build,  massive  in  the  lower 
jaw  and  powerful  of  voice.     She  was  considered 
by  some  of  her  acquaintances  to  be  a  trifle  over- 
powering, and  certainly  had  some  little  faults  of 
temper  and  manner  that  made  the  pleasure  of  her 
company  an  uncertain  quantity.     Roddy  Chalmers 
was  used  to  refer  to  her  in  his  light-hearted  way  as 
"  old  Collett's  youthful  indiscretion  " ;  and  accord- 
ing to  the  same  authority  she  was  the  only  child  of 
"  a  St.  Kitts'  beachcomber."     It  is  a  fact  that  the 
occupations  of  Lieutenant  Collett  had  formerly  taken 
him  to  the  West  Indies,  which  doubtless  was  the 
only  foundation  for  this  unflattering  rumour ;  mean- 
while she  naturally  accompanied  the  Viscount  to 
the  houses  to  which  he  was  invited;  and  although 
Mrs.  Beaufoy  did  not  greatly  affect  her  society,  she 
was  just  the  thing  to  send  in  to  dinner  with  Mr. 
Fedden,  who  accepted  her  slightly  dictatorial  man- 
ner in  inoffensive  silence,  content  to  cast  backward 
glances  at  her  as  he  ate,  like  a  nervous  dog  din- 
ing under  the  eyes  of  other  hungry  specimens  of 
the  canine  race.     Besides  the  guests  mentioned  there 
was  the  usual  assortment  of  titled  and  untitled  men 
in  tweed  clothes,  who  tramped  out  of  the  house 
in  the  morning,  and  tramped  into  it  again  at  night, 
muddy,    exhausted,    but   content;   to   dine   heavily 
and  drop  spasmodically  asleep  or  talk  painstakingly 
and  haltingly  to  the  ladies  afterwards,  until  they 
could  decently  escape  to  cigars,  whiskey,  and  the 


114     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

pleasant  review  of  the  day's  doings,  unhampered 
longer  by  female  society.  Beaufoy  was  a  digni- 
fied house;  there  were  none  of  the  noisy  young  men 
and  flighty  ladies,  married  and  unmarried,  that  are 
not  unknown  in  many  parties.  The  tweed-suited 
persons,  rightly  reckoned  as  "  the  best  people," 
were  mostly  accompanied  by  wives;  the  only  ob- 
viously unattached  guests,  besides  Henry,  himself, 
being  a  soft-voiced  elderly  poetess  from  the  United 
States,  who  passed  her  day  in  seeking,  with  un- 
deservedly scant  success,  for  an  audience  for  her 
ethical  discourses ;  and  a  young  British  musician  of 
growing  fame,  whose  technique  was  believed  to  be  a 
distinct  advance  on  that  of  Wagner  and  Strauss ;  and 
indeed  there  were  notable  differences  to  be  ob- 
served. Developing  the  modern  tendency  to  avoid 
closes  to  its  logical  conclusion,  he  availed  himself 
of  melodic  material  which,  as  he  explained,  never 
came  to  an  end  at  all,  a  quality  regarded  by  the 
uncultured  among  his  auditors  as  its  principal  dis- 
advantage; while  envious  persons  were  to  be  found 
who  contended  that  this  property  was  due  to  the 
fact  that  it  never  began.  There  were  no  longer 
such  things  as  motives  and  phrases;  pure,  formless 
melody  distilled  for  as  long  as  one  had  the  requisite 
time  to  sit  and  attend  to  it;  or  until  the  composer 
had  filled  the  necessary  number  of  sheets  of  music 
paper.  The  difficulties  with  which  this  young  man, 
still  under  the  age  of  twenty-five,  had  had  to  con- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     115 

tend  in  driving  his  theories  and  examples  into  the 
thick  heads  of  a  deplorably  poco-curante  public,  had 
fostered  the  warlike  side  of  his  nature  to  a  pitch 
which  made  him  scornful  company  for  all  but  those 
who  accepted  his  beliefs  whole,  and  were  tolerably 
assiduous  in  rehearsing  their  creed.  He  was  a 
great  pet  of  Mrs.  Beaufoy's,  but  treated  her  with 
something  of  the  carelessness  of  genius,  spending 
a  good  deal  of  his  time  in  his  bedroom  and  most 
of  the  rest  in  the  smoking  room,  where  his  only 
companion  was  Mr.  Coleman,  who  had  a  passion 
for  the  acquaintance  of  celebrities,  actual  or  poten- 
tial. The  sight  of  the  serpentine  collateral  of  the 
nobility,  who  was  entirely  tone-deaf,  rapt  in  de- 
light at  the  complicated  technical  and  poetical  ex- 
positions of  the  young  maestro,  was  a  pleasing  ex- 
ample of  the  power  of  the  Arts,  even  over  the 
most  unlikely  subjects. 

Among  this  assembly  of  people,  Patrice  moved, 
Henry  thought,  soon  after  his  arrival,  as  might 
some  resuscitated  hamadryad  through  the  crowd 
at  a  remnant  sale,  or  a  Praxiteles  Apollo  set  sud- 
denly alive  on  the  Stock  Exchange.  She  had  only 
returned  to  her  home  the  day  before  her  lover  ar- 
rived there,  and  the  curl  of  her  sweet,  full  lips  dis- 
played plainly  to  the  discerning  eyes  of  love  that 
she  had  little  in  sympathy  with  the  guests  whom  her 
mother  had  collected.  Apart  from  Henry  him- 
self, whom  she  greeted  with  a  languorous  loving- 


ii6     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

ness  that  sent  a  thrill  of  rapture  to  his  heart  and 
instantly  displaced  from  his  mind  any  vulgar  in- 
truders that  might  have  recently  sought  to  find 
a  foothold  in  it,  there  was  no  one  to  whom  she 
found  it  desirable  to  address  more  than  the  briefest 
and  most  unavoidable  words,  except  the  daughter 
of  one  of  the  shooters,  a  certain  Rosemary  Hill- 
Fegan,  a  tall,  dark,  Irish  girl,  pathetically  slender, 
with  eyes  like  wet  irises,  who  spent  a  good  part  of 
each  day  folded  in  Patrice's  arms  in  the  embra- 
sures of  windows  and  other  cushioned  recesses. 
Miss  Hill-Fegan  regarded  Henry  with  bitter  ha- 
tred as  her  rival  in  Patrice's  affections,  but  her 
awe  for  the  lovely  bride  generally  forbade  any  mani- 
festation of  this  feeling  in  her  presence.  Mean- 
while Patrice  devoted  a  considerable  part  of  her 
time  to  her  girl  adorer,  and  there  was  a  tolerably 
brisk  interchange  of  presents  between  the  two 
nymphs  —  trifling  pieces  of  jewelry,  ribbon-tied 
copies  of  the  Rubaiyat  of  Omar  Khayyam,  of 
which  poem  more  than  one  new  edition  had,  oddly 
enough,  appeared  recently;  songs  for  Patrice  to 
sing  to  the  somnolent  guests  after  dinner  in  the 
great  Saloon,  with  a  scornful  knowledge  that  to 
most  of  them  the  genius  of  Bemberg,  Faure,  Mas- 
senet, and  Reynaldo  Hahn  was  less  than  nothing, 
while  to  Guy  Harris,  the  composer,  the  mention 
of  their  names  was  the  signal  for  a  display  of  mani- 
fest jealousy,  which  had  already  resulted  in  bad 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     117 

blood  between  them.  Nor  was  Miss  Beaufoy  at  any 
pains  to  conceal  her  distaste  for  the  company  in 
general;  Henry  could  hardly  avoid  smiling  as  he 
noted  the  proud  aloofness  with  which  she  circulated 
among  the  admiring  groundlings,  all  of  whom,  he 
knew,  were  slaves  to  her  beauty  and  content  with 
her  contemptuous  toleration  of  their  worship.  For, 
although  she  was  so  meagre  of  the  reward  of  speech 
and  smiles,  the  presence  of  Patrice  Beaufoy  in  a 
house,  even  her  own,  meant,  like  Tariff  Reform, 
work  for  all.  She  had  an  adorably  childish  way 
of  forgetting  things  that  she  wanted,  and  a  petu- 
lant air  of  remembering  their  absence  that  sent  a 
dozen  men  running  errands  for  her;  pianos  had  to 
be  opened;  music  found,  arranged  and  turned; 
windows  thrown  wide,  when  the  sweet,  fresh  air 
of  evening  set  the  older  and  thinner  of  the  guests 
shivering;  Patrice's  dogs  to  be  caught,  in  the  teeth, 
literally,  of  strong  opposition,  and  brought  to  their 
lady,  who  generally  found  that  the  craving  for 
their  company  had  by  that  time  passed,  or  that  the 
wrong  animal  had  been  apprehended.  A  true  queen 
by  nature,  she  accepted  such  service  as  a  right,  and 
often  scarcely  deigned  to  glance  at  her  courtiers, 
as  she  formally  thanked  them.  Mr.  Harris  was 
the  only  rebel  of  the  party;  neither  hand  nor  foot 
did  he  move  on  her  behalf,  his  pride  having  been 
mortally  wounded,  on  the  first  evening  that  he  sat 
next  to  her  at  dinner,  by  discovering  that  she  had 


ii8     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

brought  in  a  partly-knitted  silk  tie,  at  which  she 
worked  delicately  in  the  intervals  of  the  meal,  to 
avoid  the  necessity  of  conversation  with  himself  or 
Mr.  Colman,  who  was  on  her  other  side.  -In  ad- 
dition to  this  droll  unconventionality,  which  he 
hypersensitively  persisted  in  regarding  as  a  slight, 
the  musician  considered  that  Patrice's  singing,  of 
which  he  professed  himself  no  admirer,  resulted 
in  a  monopoly  of  the  use  of  the  piano;  so  that  he 
was  precluded  from  surprising  the  assembly,  as 
he  had  hoped,  with  performances  of  his  own  works ; 
a  natural  artistic  ambition  which  was  doubtless  suf- 
ficient to  account  for  his  failure  fully  to  appreciate 
Patrice's  voice  which,  although  almost  entirely  un- 
trained, owing  to  the  difficulties  which  its  owner 
had  encountered  in  finding  an  efficient  and  at  the 
same  time  polite  instructor,  was  generally  acknow- 
ledged to  be  rather  out  of  the  common.  Mr. 
Harris  had  other  rivals  as  well  for  the  possession 
of  the  desired  instrument,  in  the  persons  of  two 
or  three  of  the  male  guests,  hearty,  sporting  men 
with  virile,  powerful  voices,  who  condescended  at 
times  to  regale  the  company  with  "  The  Meynell 
Hunt,"  or  "The  Old  Stable- Jacket,"  performed 
fortissimo  in  unison  to  the  accompaniment  of  a  few 
simple  but  sufficient  chords ;  an  entertainment  which 
was  much  enjoyed  by  those  guests  whose  tastes  in 
music  were  simple  and  normal.  Apart  from  the 
irritable  genius,  however,  Patrice  had  a  compliant 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     119 

court,  for  the  only  other  person  who  ever  failed 
to  obey  her  behests,  her  brother  Ivan,  was  fortu- 
nately not  of  the  party ;  fortunately,  because  both  his 
sister  and  mother,  it  cannot  be  denied,  cordially 
disliked  the  young  soldier,  whose  male  brusquerie 
and  constant  assertion  of  that  predominance  to 
which  he  was  entitled  as  a  member  of  the  nobler 
sex  were  not  entirely  comprehensible  to  ladies  who 
had  passed  a  good  deal  of  their  time  in  countries 
where  the  views  of  life  are  often  oddly  divergent 
from  that  plain  sense  that  distinguishes  our  land. 
As  for  Mrs.  Beaufoy,  herself,  she  never  ceased  in 
her  ministrations  to  her  beloved  daughter,  although 
in  private  she  would  sometimes  prefer  to  friends 
half-laughing  complaints  of  the  young  princess's 
exactions;  complaints  which,  however,  resulted  in 
no  diminution  of  her  own  labours  in  the  girl's  be- 
half. If  when  travelling,  for  instance,  there  were 
only  two  available  rooms  in  an  hotel  for  their  re- 
ception, it  was  Patrice  who  obtained,  at  her 
mother's  own  request,  the  larger,  sunnier  or  other- 
wise more  desirable  of  the  two;  if,  in  London, 
Patrice  required  the  motor  car  on  the  same  after- 
noon as  Mrs.  Beaufoy,  for  a  divergent  purpose, 
she  got  it  without  question,  and  the  elder  lady  took 
a  "taxi";  if  the  daughter  discovered  a  draught 
where  she  sat  in  a  room,  and  mentioned  it  with  a 
pouting  shiver  to  her  maman,  maman  gave  up  her 
'own  place  to  her,  and  sat  in  the  draught  herself, 


120     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

protesting  that  she  did  not  feel  it.  It  was  charm- 
ing to  see  this  grey-headed,  amply-built,  not  over- 
strong  lady's  anxious  care  for  her  young  and  peren- 
nially blooming  child ;  charming,  too,  to  observe  the 
babyish  self-abandonment  with  which  Patrice  de- 
pended helplessly  and  with  a  naughty  wilfulness 
on  her  mother  for  the  gratification  of  all  her  needs 
and  fancies,  and  for  protection  against  the  mascu- 
line discipline  she  would  else  have  had  to  endure 
from  frere. 

After  the  hot  ugliness  of  a  deserted  London,  re- 
lieved only  by  the  unromantic  volubility  of  Flora 
Evans,  it  was  like  a  dream  for  Henry  to  find  him- 
self once  more  awaiting  his  lover  in  the  panelled, 
prielled  room,  radiant  with  flowers  and  thoughtful 
with  books,  which  Patrice  used  as  a  boudoir,  an 
apartment  for  which  she  had  daily  and  hourly  use, 
being  at  the  pouting  age  of  indulged  maidenhood. 
He  had  paid  his  respects  to  his  hostess  in  the  draw- 
ing-room among  the  negligible  members  of  the 
gathering;  but  his  eyes  had  sought  the  door  in 
vain,  at  every  new  opening,  for  the  form  of  his  be- 
loved; angry  and  impatient  each  time  that  some 
lumping,  exhausted  man,  returned  from  the  fields, 
rolled  heavily  into  the  room.  It  was  not  until  he 
had  patiently  declined,  for  the  third  or  fourth  time, 
the  offer  of  more  tea,  that  Mrs.  Beaufoy  enlight- 
ened him  as  to  the  romantic  arrangements  of  her 
daughter;  who,  unable  to  face  meeting  her  be- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     121 

trothed,  for  the  first  time  after  absence,  among  the 
profane  crowd,  had  given  orders  that  he  should 
await  her  alone  in  her  own  bower.  Thither,  after 
a  long  and  stimulating  interval,  she  descended  to 
him,  royally  seductive  in  a  wonderful  silver  dress 
of  her  own  design,  with  rounded  arms  bare  to  the 
elbow,  and  her  gorgeous  hair  braided  into  a  mag- 
nificent crown  about  her  proud  head ;  to  come  with- 
out a  smile  or  word,  in  a  slow,  languid  movement 
of  infinite  grace  to  her  adorer's  arms,  and  with 
closed  eyes,  hold  up  her  full,  scarlet  lips  "  in  sover- 
eign surrender,"  as  she  quoted  to  herself  even  in 
that  great  moment,  for  his  kiss.  Patrice  Beaufoy 
had  a  natural  and  healthy  taste  for  kissing,  which 
she  had,  since  her  engagement,  been  able  to  in- 
dulge with  English  freedom;  but  to  her  lover, 
whose  countrymen  have,  no  doubt  with  self-con- 
scious prudence,  postponed  the  full  enjoyment  of 
this  ancient  and  agreeable  ceremony,  among  the 
richer  classes  at  least,  until  after  marriage,  the  inti- 
macy was  not  entirely  an  unmixed  delight,  for  rea- 
sons which  must  always  remain  to  our  race  a  little 
incomprehensible.  Foreigners  of  Latin  stock  are 
apt  to  attach  an  undue  importance  to  quite  simple 
matters  where  sex  is  concerned;  including  thereby 
an  artificial  but  somewhat  overwhelming  exaltation. 
However  D'Albiac's  commendable  ambition  to  be 
in  all  things  a  thorough  English  sportsman  made 
him  particularly  careful  to  avoid  any  appearance 


122     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

of  this  childish  over-estimate  of  an  everyday  af- 
fair, and  he  contrived  to  steer  a  more  or  less  suc- 
cessful course  between  the  shoals  of  chilliness  on 
the  one  hand  and  the  breakers  of  exotic  explosive- 
ness  on  the  other. 

Up  till  the  present  time  the  two  young  people  had 
not  had  the  constant  private  opportunities  for  spir- 
itual intercourse  which  they  now  enjoyed.  At 
Nice,  in  London  and  elsewhere  they  had,  except  for 
brief  and  memorable  moments,  met  generally  in  the 
society  of  others;  and  the  communion  of  souls 
which  they  were  aware  existed  so  intimately  be- 
tween them  had  been  obliged  to  live  under  the  eyes 
of  the  world  and,  for  the  most  part,  in  silence  or 
only  through  the  medium  of  hints  and  chance 
phrases.  But  in  September  at  Beaufoy  they  were, 
at  first,  seldom  out  of  each  other's  company  or  un- 
able to  pour  out  their  hearts  in  fullest  privacy;  un- 
less during  those  hours  of  which  Miss  Hill-Fegan 
had  obtained  the  grant,  by  dint  of  prayers  and 
angry  tears.  As  Henry  was  not  shooting,  he  was, 
of  course,  left  all  day  as  the  only  male  being  of 
any  importance  in  the  house,  if  we  except  Patrice's 
dogs  and  the  Hope  of  English  music,  mysteriously 
closeted  in  his  bedroom.  The  Frenchman  was  cap- 
able of  enjoying  this  position  among  a  number  of 
well-dressed  women,  but  was  aware  that  such  a 
character  is  generally  contemned  in  the  land  of  his 
recent  adoption;  and  besides  he  had  come  to  Wilt- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     123 

shire  expressly  to  live  wholly  and  alone  in  the  per- 
sonality of  his  mistress.  He  was  surprised  at  first, 
absurdly  enough,  to  find  that  conversation  with 
her  after  some  of  these  long  periods  of'  privacy 
became  difficult;  allowing  nothing,  it  would  seem, 
for  maidenly  prudency,  inexpressible  emotions  and 
the  natural  surprises  incident  to  a  complete  unveil- 
ing to  each  other  of  their  whole  natures.  Some- 
times it  even  seemed  to  him  as  if  Patrice,  nay,  as 
if  both  of  them,  were  not  unpleasantly  interrupted 
in  their  long  confidences  by  the  deep  voice  of  the 
distant  outdoor  bell  which  gave  warning  of  im- 
pending meals,  or  by  the  entrance  of  a  third  party  — 
generally  Patrice's  maid  with  a  message  from  Mrs. 
Beaufoy  or  a  love-letter,  gorged  with  reproaches, 
from  Rosemary  Hill-Fegan.  Whether  Miss  Beau- 
foy was  herself  conscious  of  such  an  atmosphere 
was  not  at  first  certain;  or  whether,  if  she  were, 
it  affected  her  happiness;  but  Henry  worried  him- 
self a  good  deal  on  the  score;  wondering  angrily 
why  it  was  that  he  failed  sometimes  to  interest  his 
mistress;  still  more  angrily  why,  at  hateful  mo- 
ments, the  divinity  herself  uttered  sentiments  that 
chilled  him,  or  failed  to  respond  to  a  proposition 
of  his  own  with  that  whole-hearted  understanding 
that  he  was  certain  really  existed  between  them; 
which,  at  least,  he  held  to  be  essential  between  man 
and  wife.  Lovely  as  she  was,  there  were  yet  times 
when,  gazing  on  her  downcast  eyes  and  warm  pal- 


124     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

lor,  he  could  not  avoid  feeling  that  the  conversa- 
tion was  absurdly  difficult  to  keep  at  a  level  of  sus- 
tained excellence;  and  a  base  thought  of  the  rapidity 
with  which  the  long  sittings  to  the  Chelsea  painter 
had  passed,  and  an  even  baser  inner  desire,  in- 
stantly suppressed,  for  a  good,  argumentative,  quar- 
relsome talk  with  his  little  middle-class  friend,  in- 
truded themselves  momentarily  into  his  mind,  with- 
out waiting  for  any  formal  invitation.  Yet  this 
virginal  reserve,  this  girlish  innocence  as  opposed 
to  the  self-assertion  of  mature  womanhood,  this 
slight  touch  of  lovely  gaucherie  he  knew  to  be  among 
his  lover's  chief est  charms;  she  who  was  always  so 
queenly  —  although  truly,  not  particularly  voluble 
—  with  others  was  silent,  blushing,  almost  humble 
with  himself,  a  proud  subject  to  his  masculine  power 
and  the  love  with  which  he  had  awakened  her  from 
her  childish  dreams.  At  this  point  the  traitor 
doubts  in  his  mind  were  generally  solved  for  that 
occasion  by  a  return  to  those  wordless  endearments 
which  were  the  surest  ground  between  the  pair, 
and  which  Patrice  was  ever  ready  to  grant  and  ac- 
cept. 

It  was  about  a  week  after  his  arrival  that  she, 
herself,  first  inspired  him  with  a  qualmish  suspicion 
that  she  had  shared  his  feelings  of  constraint  and 
dubiety. 

"  Mon  ami,"  she  said,  after  an  awkward  silence, 
during  which  Henry  was  aware  that  he  had  shuffled 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     125 

his  feet  and  cleared  his  throat,  more  than  once,  in 
a  rather  bourgeois  manner.  "  You're  not  shooting 
this  year  ?  " 

"  Not  this  year,"  he  agreed. 

"  I  like  you  to  shoot,"  she  persisted,  raising  her 
soft  eyes  to  his. 

"Why?  Are  you  tired  of  my  company?"  he 
asked,  with  a  thrill  in  his  deep  voice,  which  struck 
his  own  ear  as  not  entirely  spontaneous. 

Patrice,  who  was  beside  him  on  the  window  seat, 
whence  they  had  been  commending  a  decorative 
sunset  in  a  handsome  manner,  shut  her  eyes,  and 
tilted  her  head  backwards  towards  his  shoulder  as 
her  only  reply. 

"  You  know,"  he  said,  with  his  face  against  hers, 
"  that  I  gave  it  up  only  to  be  with  you  —  with  you, 
always." 

"Yes,"  she  sighed,  happily.  "I  know.  Still, 
I  want  you  to  be  like  other  men,  Henry.  It's 
odious  to  think  that  some  of  these  dull  persons,  who 
are  inferior  to  you  in  sport,  as  well  as  in  everything 
else,  should  be  laughing  at  you  for  being  left  with 
the  women  every  day.  My  love  must  be  a  man 
among  men." 

"What  does  it  matter  what  others  think?"  he 
cried  scornfully.  "  You  are  my  world ;  the  rest 
doesn't  exist  for  me,  or  only  as  a  vague  background 
of  shadows  for  your  figure." 

An  agreeable  interlude  succeeded  these  words, 


126     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

which  Henry  recognised  as  being  in  his  best  man- 
ner, and  somewhat  striking  in  conception.  He  was 
hurt  to  see,  however,  that  Patrice  stuck  to  the  ques- 
tion with  a  touch  of  obstinacy. 

"  I  feel  that,  too,"  she  admitted,  "  but  I  want  to 
be  proud  of  you,  mon  ami.  I  don't  want  to  be  a 
Delilah." 

She  broke  off  to  sing  in  an  undertone: 

"  Re  ponds  a  ma  tendresse  ....  Ah!  Verse 
moi  I'ivresse  ....  I  think  that  is  the  most  beautiful 
song  ever  written,  Henry." 

"  Dalilah,  Dalilah,  je  t'aime,"  Henry  responded, 
with  appropriate  "  business,"  but  perversely  wish- 
ing, internally,  that  it  was  not  necessary  in  song  to 
speak  of  "  ivrasse  "  and  "  tendrasse." 

"  What  were  we  talking  about  ?  "  asked  the  girl, 
after  a  pause  for  the  mental  worship  of  Saint-Saens 
and  of  the  librettist  who  has  reproduced  the  bar- 
baric atmosphere  of  those  far-off  days  in  so  ac- 
curate, yet  tender  a  manner.  "  Oh,  yes.  There's 
no  reason  in  any  case,  dear  one,  that  you  should 
not  enjoy  yourself  in  the  ordinary  manner  some- 
times. My  Rosemary  is  terribly  jealous  of  you; 
I  ought  to  give  more  time  to  her ;  it's  not  for  long, 
Henriot." 

"  Oh,  Rosemary ! "  he  said,  in  a  huff. 

"You  mustn't  be  cruel,"  said  Patrice  gently. 
"  She's  devoted  to  me,  and  she  feels  she's  lost  me. 
And  besides,  the  other  day  when  Maman  insisted  on 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     127 

driving  me  over  to  Mallock  Park  —  you  didn't  go 
out  with  the  shooters  then." 

"  I  didn't  bring  my  guns,"  he  explained. 

"  But  there  are  plenty  in  the  house,"  pouted 
Patrice,  whom  a  chance  word  overheard  when  pass- 
ing a  group  of  the  shooters  had  inflamed.  She  had 
no  intention  that  her  lover  and  herself  should  become 
food  for  the  tasteless  jokes  and  innuendos  of  the 
smoking  room.  "  Frere  has  a  half-a-dozen  spare 
at  least  in  the  gunroom.  I  know,  because  one  of 
them  was  lent  the  other  day  to  that  odious  Mr. 
Harris,  when  he  deigned  to  go  out,  and  nearly  blew 
Lord  Honiton's  head  off.  And  Mrs.  Fedden's 
husband  brought  a  perfect  battery  of  weapons  with 
him.  Why  don't  you  borrow  one?  " 

"  Darling,"  he  said,  with  an  injured  air,  "  I 
thought  you  would  be  pleased  at  my  sacrific- 
ing-" 

"  I  am.  I  have  been.  I  accept  the  sacrifice, 
mon  ami"  she  murmured,  in  her  dove's  voice. 
"  And  now  you  have  proved  your  unselfishness  and 
your  wish  to  be  always  with  me,  I  release  you ;  and 
order  you  to  leave  me  occasionally  and  take  your 
proper  part  in  the  ordinary  life  of  a  country  gentle- 
man." 

"  If  you  order,  I  do  it,  of  course,"  he  said,  with 
bad  grace.  "  But  it's  cruel  to  banish  me  from 
you.  And  I  hate  using  other  men's  guns.  It  spoils 
one's  shooting  altogether." 


128     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"They  all  know  that;  and  if  you  distinguish 
yourself  with  a  strange  gun,  I  shall  be  all  the 
prouder  of  you,"  said  Patrice  fondly. 

Somehow  all  this  magniloquence  and  discussion 
about  such  a  trivial  matter  irritated  Henry,  whose 
nerves  were,  as  lovers'  often  are,  not  in  the  calm- 
est condition. 

"  It's  such  a  small  thing  to  be  proud  of.  I  hope 
to  do  things  that  will  be  worthier  of  you  than  that," 
he  protested. 

"Of  course  you  will  —  you  do,  now.  Still  I 
wish  to  see  you  excel  in  everything.  And  it's  right 
that  men  should  pride  themselves  on  their  skill  in 
sports." 

"  Some  sports,  perhaps,"  grumbled  Henry,  who, 
criminally  aware  of  awkward  relief  at  the  pros- 
pect of  more  diversified  days  in  the  future  and  a 
change  from  these  almost  too  honeyed  and  pro- 
tracted interviews,  attempted  to  disguise  his  sen- 
sations to  himself  by  assuming  a  resentful  air 
towards  Patrice  for  suggesting  the  change,  and 
mentally  accusing  her  of  being  the  only  malcontent. 
"  Some  sports,  perhaps.  But  shooting !  Any 
idiot  with  a  pair  of  tolerable  eyes  can  learn  to  hold 
a  gun  straight  enough  in  time.  It's  only  a  ques- 
tion of  practice  and  opportunity.  Probably  any 
one  of  your  footmen  could  become  a  better  shot 
than  I  am,  if  he  was  allowed  to  try." 

Miss  Beaufoy  scrutinised  him  with  a  chilly  dis- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     129 

pleasure;  for  she  was  not  very  tolerant  of  con- 
tradiction. 

"  You  know  that  isn't  so.     Mr.  Colman  — " 

"  Oh,  Colman.  Colman's  rather  an  exceptional 
person,  fortunately.  Besides  he's  old  and  blind. 
Why,  he  wears  a  sort  of  eyeglass  hanging  off  the 
brim  of  his  hat,  when  he  shoots,  to  try  to  focus 
his  poor  old  eyes.  Naturally  he  never  hits  any- 
thing, except  by  mistake.  I'm  talking  of  reason- 
ably young  and  whole  people." 

The  tone  of  irritation  was  so  apparent  in  his 
voice  that  Patrice  had  a  sensation  that  was  almost 
fear.  She  was  no  Maid  of  Orleans  by  nature. 

"  You  used  to  say  that  shooting  and  hunting 
were  the  only  things  you  cared  about,"  she  ventured 
to  remark. 

"  They're  well  enough  for  boys.  And  I  like 
them  now ;  I  said  I  did ;  particularly  hunting,  which 
takes  some  courage,  if  you  care  to  ride  hard.  Be- 
sides, that's  exercise.  Shooting  is  only  an  excuse 
for  taking  a  slow  walk ;  and,  although  I  don't  want 
to  be  sentimental,  it  is  cruel,  you  know,  Patrice." 

He  could  not  quite  have  said  why  he  suddenly 
took  up  this  humanitarian  point  of  view  publicly; 
for  though  he  had  argued  the  point  in  his  own 
mind  continually  of  late,  he  would  have  been 
ashamed  some  hours  before  to  have  used  such 
words.  The  present  outburst  was  partly  due  to  ir- 
ritability no  doubt,  but  also,  and  oddly,  to  a  child- 


130     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

ish  desire  to  present  some  of  his  lately-acquired 
ideas  for  his  lover's  admiration.  Apparently,  as 
far  as  this  one  was  concerned,  however,  the  experi- 
ment was  not  successful.  Patrice  laughed  pity- 
ingly. 

"  Dear  me !  "  she  said  provocatively.  "  I'd  no 
idea  you  were  so  tender-hearted,  Henry.  You're 
not  going  to  turn  into  a  faddist  and  wear  Jaeger 
boots  with  toes  in  them  and  live  entirely  on  nuts 
and  temperance  champagne,  I  hope  ?  " 

D'Albiac  wore  a  face  of  stone;  no  one  should 
laugh  at  him  with  impunity,  he  said  to  himself 
viciously,  not  even  his  adored  Patrice,  who  wore 
a  tiresome  smile  at  present  that  he  imagined  quite 
spoiled  the  beauty  of  her  face. 

"  It  is  cruel,"  he  persisted,  with  a  flashing  recol- 
lection of  Flora's  phrases  and  the  round,  soft  hurry 
of  her  speech.  "  And  pain  and  cruelty  aren't 
funny,  darling,  even  when  they're  unavoidable." 

Miss  Beaufoy's  face  flamed  at  the  words;  she 
was  seriously  and  quite  naturally  angry. 

"  I  see !  You  accuse  me  of  being  cruel  ?  "  she 
said,  drawing  away  from  him,  and  lifting  her  fine 
head  proudly. 

"  We're  all  cruel,  consciously  or  unconsciously," 
replied  D'Albiac  implacably.  "  You  must  own  that 
winging  birds  and  cutting  pigs'  throats  — " 

Patrice  put  her  hand  to  her  own  plump  throat 
with  a  little  gasp  of  disgust. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     131 

"Must  we  hear  all  this?  "  she  asked  pathetically, 
with  the  old  look  of  a  beseeching  child. 

"  But  it's  cowardice  just  to  shirk  the  subject," 
cried  Henry,  angrily. 

He  felt  he  was  going  too  far,  and  his  heart  sank 
and  his  inexplicable  fury  was  chillily  extinguished 
in  a  second  as  he  saw  his  lover  rise  to  her  feet. 

"  I'm  afraid  I  can't  discuss  these  things,"  she 
said,  with  signs  of  coming  tears  in  her  voice.  "  I 
didn't  think  you  could  be  so  rough  to  me,  Henry. 
You  know  that  I  can't  bear  dreadful  subjects. 
You're  very  unkind." 

"  Patrice !  "  he  gasped  with  a  guilty  attempt  to 
seize  her  hands,  as  she  left  him. 

"  No,  please !  "  she  said,  faintly.  "  I  think  I  will 
go  and  lie  down  a  little.  There's  only  an  hour 
before  lunch.  I  don't  feel  very  well." 

"Forgive  me,"  he  said  contritely.  "  I'm  a  brute. 
I  can't  think  how  I  came  to  — " 

Patrice  gave  a  wan  smile. 

"  We  must  try  to  forget  it,"  she  said,  with 
Christian  gentleness.  "  Never  again,  I  beg.  I 
can't  quarrel;  it  shatters  me;  but  there  are  things 
that  aren't  to  be  discussed ;  I  hoped  you  knew  that. 
No,  I'm  not  angry;  and  I'm  not  ill  —  only  a  little 
—  a  little  tired." 

She  had  reached  the  door  as  she  spoke  and  disap- 
peared, still  with  the  same  air  of  sweet  forgive- 
ness, leaving  D'Albiac  upright  and  motionless  in 


132     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

the  window  seat,  in  a  curious  mixture  of  emotions. 
He  was  appalled  at  his  brutality  to  this  gentle  be- 
ing, and  at  the  obvious  wounds  that  he  had  in- 
flicted on  one  whom  he  loved  better  than  all  the 
world.  At  the  same  time  he  was  harassed  by  an 
unendurable  sensation  of  angry  surprise,  as  he 
realised  that,  in  his  intercourse  with  Patrice,  many 
subjects,  perhaps  the  greater  part  of  life,  were 
taboo.  This  was  all  very  sweet  and  charming  and 
romantic,  he  thought,  but  how  avoid  the  real,  dur- 
ing the  long  years  of  connubial  relations?  An  at- 
tempt to  laugh  it  off  with  the  belief  that  she  must 
of  course  change  with  age  and  knowledge  and 
gradual  experience  of  facts,  was  not  altogether  suc- 
cessful. How  deeply  rooted  in  this  petted  and  pro- 
tected child  was  this  shuddering  inability  to  turn 
her  eyes  away  from  the  rosy  dream-life  on  to  a 
necessarily  hard  and  coarse  world?  And  why  had 
he  always  accepted  her  limited  outlook,  until  the 
last  few  minutes,  as  the  only  proper  and  desirable 
one  for  a  cultivated  human  creature,  at  any  rate  of 
the  female  sex,  to  hold?  It  was  not  possible  that 
he,  himself,  had  suddenly  cast  off  adolescence  and 
become  a  man;  still  less,  yes,  still  less,  that  half-a- 
dozen  meetings  with  a  comparatively  uninspiring 
person  of  a  considerably  lower  rank  than  himself 
could  change  his  whole  point  of  view;  although, 
possibly,  the  mere  encounter  with  classes  and 
things  from  which  he  had  hitherto  been  shielded 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     133 

might  have  opened  his  eyes  to  some  extent  on  the 
unpleasant  side  of  life.  At  least,  there  was  cer- 
tainly no  personal  influence  in  the  matter ;  certainly 
none.  Certainly  none. 

For  the  present,  his  strongest  sensation  was 
naturally  repentance,  and  it  was  thus  garbed  in 
humility  that  he  appeared  at  the  luncheon-table  an 
hour  later.  Patrice  had  punished  him  by  arriving 
early,  a  thing  unprecedented,  and  entrenching  her- 
self between  Lord  Honiton  and  Colman ;  Henry,  who 
was  the  last  arrival,  having  to  take  a  place  on  the 
opposite  side  of  the  table,  and  some  distance  from 
her,  between  Lady  Honiton,  whom  he  detested,  and 
the  American  poetess,  Miss  Lyman,  whom  he  re- 
garded with  the  dread  common  to  all  the  guests. 
The  ill-fortune  was  sufficient  to  turn  his  penitence 
into  renewed  captiousness,  and  he  was  not  long  in 
falling  foul  of  Lady  Honiton,  who  was  always 
ready  and  anxious  for  a  quarrel  with  anybody  and 
upon  any  subject.  The  morning  papers  had  con- 
tained certain  facetious  articles  on  the  prison  ex- 
periences of  some  arrested  suffragists,  and  com- 
pulsory feeding  had  been  made  the  subject  of  a 
number  of  excellent  jests,  which,  for  one  reason  and 
another,  the  Frenchman  was  unable  to  enjoy  as 
much  as  his  neighbour,  whose  amusement,  it  must 
be  admitted,  was  of  rather  a  revengeful  and  not 
altogether  mirthful  kind.  D'Albiac  contented  him- 
self at  first  with  a  comparatively  reticent  statement 


134     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

of  his  dislike  of  the  treatment,  without  arguing  the 
question  of  its  justification;  and  Lady  Honiton 
scenting  a  quarrel,  plunged  forthwith  into  provoca- 
tive remarkis.  The  creatures  were  lunatics  and 
must  be  treated  as  such;  if  any  were  still  mentally 
sound,  it  was  a  well-deserved  punishment  and 
warning  to  potential  offenders  against  order. 

"  Don't  you  agree  ?  "  she  bellowed,  during  a  pause 
in  the  conversation,  with  the  desired  result  of  at- 
tracting the  attention  of  most  of  the  table  to  Henry, 
whose  temper  was  marked  in  its  rise  by  the  colour 
of  his  cheeks.  He  shook  his  head  with  a  shrug, 
but  refused  to  be  provoked. 

"  Oh,  my  dear  man,"  her  Ladyship  remonstrated, 
in  the  same  stupendous  tones.  "  Then  I  suppose 
you're  one  of  these  crazy  people  yourself  ? " 

D'Albiac,  flushed,  but  with  calm  eyebrows  and 
eyes,  silently  helped  himself  to  a  dish  that  was  of- 
fered him. 

"  I  really  believe  he  is,  do  you  know  ?  "  crowed 
Mr.  Colman,  with  a  writhe  of  ecstasy.  "  Just  a 
teeny-weeny  wee  bittie  of  a  Suffragette.  Yes,  yes, 
D'Albiac,  you  shall  own  to  it.  Capital,  indeed ! " 

"  In  that  case  you're  hopeless,  of  course,"  Lady 
Honiton  laughed,  in  a  snorting  manner.  "  I  sup- 
pose you've  got  some  friends  among  these  women 
who've  perverted  your  mind,  Mr.  D'Albiac;  is  that 
it?" 

"  Certainly  not,"  answered  Henry,  with  a  cold 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     135 

ambiguity,  which  he  perceived  afterwards  went  per- 
ilously near  to  untruth;  but  Patrice's  eyes  were  on 
him,  and  he  spoke  before  he  thought. 

"  If  you  haven't,  you're  not  going  to  be  let  off, 
is  he  ?  "  cried  Colman,  dabbing  at  him  with  a  hand 
in  which  the  tips  of  the  thumb  and  second  finger 
were  joined.  "  You  shall  be  defeated ;  you  can't 
be  allowed  to  hold  such  horrid  views,  you  very 
wicked  person !  " 

Henry  was  relieved  that  a  man  had  taken  up  the 
attack  momentarily,  and  turned  on  the  sprightly 
Colman,  who  imagined  his,  jokes  entirely  accept- 
able, in  quite  a  savage  manner. 

"It  isn't  a  question  of  views,"  he  said  hotly. 
"  Any  man  —  anybody  fit  to  be  called  a  man,  that 
is  —  would  be  disgusted  to  hear  such  brutalities 
treated  as  if  they  were  funny.  If  it  happened  in 
my  country  the  government  would  fall  next  day, 
and  probably  the  prison  would  be  burnt  down  into 
the  bargain." 

Lady  Honiton  looked  with  raised  eyebrows  and 
a  smile  of  open  suspicion  first  upon  Patrice,  who 
dropped  her  lids  and  coloured  faintly,  next  on  her 
hostess,  who  intervened  in  her  fat,  slow  voice. 

"  My  dear  Henry,  if  you're  so  hot  about  it,  we 
shall  begin  to  believe  Lady  Honiton's  first  sup- 
position must  be  right." 

"  Oh,  yes !  Oh,  quite !  Delicious !  "  cried  Col- 
man, in  rapturous  gratitude  at  this  support  from 


136     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

headquarters.  "  Miss  Beauf oy,  I  warn  you !  He's  a 
naughty  man !  You  remember  what  Roddy  told  us 
the  pretty  suffragettes  — " 

This,  however,  was  more  than  Lady  Honiton 
could  bear. 

"  Rubbish !  Pretty  suffragettes !  Why,  French- 
men are  always  on  a  woman's  side,  however 
atrociously  she  behaves.  Don't  you  remember  that 
bomb-throwing  creature  some  years  ago  ?  " 

"  And  I  would  say,  D'Albiac,"  put  in  her  hus- 
band, in  his  most  sonorous  debating  voice,  "  that  it 
is  a  little  unbecoming  to  accept  the  hospitality  of 
a  country  —  a  country  that  has  always  opened  its 
doors  wide  to  men  of  all  countries  —  and  to  repay 
that  hospitality  by  comparisons  of  a  depreciative 
character." 

"  Was  it  depreciative  ?  "  said  Henry,  smiling  in- 
dustriously and  gradually  thereby  recovering  his 
temper,  which  he  was  ashamed  to  have  lost  over  one 
whom  he  irreverently  thought  of  as  a  rude  old 
woman.  "  I  only  remarked  that  in  my  country  we 
should  throw  out  the  government  over  these  events ; 
but  that  the  English  believed  them  to  be  justified  in 
their  action.  I  went  no  further;  I  made  no  com- 
ment." 

"  Pardon  me,"  Lord  Honiton  insisted,  with  up- 
lifted hand.  "Your  innuendo  was  plain;  that  we 
are  a  race  of  brutes  without  respect  for  women. 
You  will  allow  me  to  insist  that  in  true  chivalry 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     137 

we  are  unsurpassed;  we  may  not  make  so  much 
parade  of  our  feelings  to  women;  but  where  they 
are  concerned  —  where  true  womanly  women  are 
concerned,  not  these  unsexed,  howling  hooligans  — 
we  are  the  politest  race  in  the  world;  in  the  world! 
Let  me  tell  you,  D'Albiac,  that  I  have  seen  old  men, 
older  men  than  myself,  give  up  seats  in  trains  to 
mere  schoolgirls,  mere  children ;  content  to  pay  that 
tribute  to  the  sex.  Do  you  suppose  that  sort  of 
thing  will  continue  if  this  senseless  agitation  lasts? 
If  these  disgusting  scenes  continue?" 

"  Indeed  that  is  so,"  Miss  Lyman  cried  with  ear- 
nest pathos.  "  If  we  descend  into  the  poelitical 
arena,  Mr.  D'Albiac,  if  we  leave  our  doemestic  du- 
ties for  the  stress  and  dust  of  public  life,  we  throw 
away  our  best  weapon ;  we  lose  our  charm,  our  pur- 
suasive  power  — " 

"  My  dear  lady,  I  have  no  wish  to  argue  the 
feminist  question  on  one  side  or  the  other,"  Henry 
protested,  laughing.  "  Prison  treatment  of  pris- 
oners was  all  I  had  in  my  mind.  At  the  same 
time,  when  you  speak  of  charm  and  persuasion, 
you  know,  I  think  you  must  be  thinking  principally 
of  rich  women,  are  you  not  ?  The  sweet  persuasive- 
ness and  charm  of  middle-aged  or  old  factory 
hands,  or  laundresses,  or  charwomen  aren't  gener- 
ally very  effective  weapons,  I'm  afraid." 

"  But  that's  our  chivalry,"  Mr.  Harris  suddenly 
cried  bitterly.  "  Chivalry  to  the  rich  and  the  pretty 


138     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

—  standing  up  in  trains  and  opening  doors  and 
taking  hats  off  to  people  in  good  clothes,  or  with 
faces  that  strike  our  fancy.  And  that's  about  all 
there  is  of  it." 

"  It  is  not,"  cried  Lord  Honiton,  to  whom  the 
mere  voice  of  Mr.  Harris  was  always  an  unfailing 
irritant.  "  It  is  only  the  outward  symbol  of  a  spirit 
that  permeates  the  whole  community." 

"Not  a  bit  of  it!"  the  musician  replied  acri- 
moniously. "  You  may  have  seen  men  older  than 
yourself  give  up  their  seats  to  schoolgirls ;  I  should 
think  it  extremely  likely.  And  I  can  say  for  my 
part  that  I've  seen  men  younger  than  myself  sit 
tight  while  a  woman  older  than  you,  Lord  Honiton, 
stood  close  beside  them,  holding  a  heavy  bundle,  and 
clinging  to  a  strap,  after  a  hard  day's  work." 

Lady  Honiton  denied  the  possibilty  of  such  a 
thing;  some  man  of  her  own  class  would  of  course 
have  given  the  poor  old  wretch  his  place ;  and  aided 
by  her  husband  the  indignant  lady  fell  upon  the  com- 
poser who,  quite  able  to  take  care  of  himself,  con- 
tinued the  fray  with  much  enjoyment,  revealing 
himself  as  a  leveller  of  the  worst  type.  His  opin- 
ions became  ultimately  so  extreme  that  his  noble 
opponent  was  compelled  to  close  the  discussion  at 
last  by  remarking  with  grave  finality  that,  if  those 
were  really  Mr.  Harris'  views,  it  was  useless  to 
attempt  any  further  endeavour  to  make  him  see 
things  in  a  patriotic,  loyal  and  English  manner; 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     139 

subsequently  refusing  to  be  drawn  into  any  further 
conversation  with  one  whom  he  now  knew  to  be 
plotting  the  destruction  of  his  own  motherland. 
Henry  was  thus  saved  from  further  baiting,  al- 
though he  saw  with  alarm  that  his  betrothed  wore 
a  look  of  pained  disgust  at  this  strange  exhibtion 
of  heterodoxy  and  ill-temper,  short  as  it  was,  on 
his  part.  Every  endeavour  to  catch  her  eye  was 
vain;  after  lunch  her  headache  persisted,  and  as 
Honiton  and  Colman  went  out  to  join  the  shooters, 
Henry  was  left  for  a  time  alone  in  the  billiard  room 
with  Harris,  a  man  whom  he  detested,  largely  on 
the  ground  of  his  rapid  familiarity  and  insufferable 
air  of  superiority,  but  to  whom  he  thought  it  polite 
to  offer  a  laughing  word  of  thanks  for  his  assist- 
ance in  the  discussion. 

"  My  dear  D'Albiac,"  Harris  said,  shrugging, 
"  I'm  not  particularly  interested  in  women,  although 
I  admit  that,  out  of  the  three  composers  that  mat- 
ter at  all  in  England  at  present,  a  woman's  one. 
But  the  only  reason  I  joined  in  was  to  have  a  smack 
at  that  old  donkey  Honiton,  who  thinks  he's  only 
to  speak  to  have  us  all  on  our  knees.  I  didn't  mean 
more  than  half  the  things  I  said.  As  for  the  vote, 
I  don't  know  or  want  to  know  anything  about  it. 
Politics  is  a  damned  dirty  trade  that  it's  better  to 
keep  out  of." 

Patrice  reappeared  at  tea,  and  was  induced  after- 
wards to  grant  a  private  audience  to  her  lover,  who, 


i4o     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

with  protestations  and  finally  kisses,  succeeded  in 
making  his  peace.  But  he  was  conscious  during  the 
remainder  of  his  stay  at  Beaufoy  that  she  wore 
an  unusually  alert  air  when  he  joined  in  the  general 
conversation  of  the  house-party;  and  that,  in  their 
rarer  and  shorter  private  meetings,  she  had  an  ap- 
pearance of  nervous  restlessness  when  the  conversa- 
tion showed  signs  of  taking  certain  directions. 
Henry  obeyed  her  wishes  by  going  out  frequently 
with  the  shooters,  though  he  himself  still  refused  to 
carry  a  gun,  and  was  pleased  to  find  that  the  com- 
pany of  his  sweetheart  became  proportionately  more 
desirable  to  him.  Yet  when  the  day  for  his  leav- 
ing her  approached  he  had  a  sad  suspicion,  which 
he  could  not  entirely  reject,  that  their  hearts  had 
been  closer  together  before  the  visit  began.  He 
blamed  his  own  unaccountable  indiscretion  for  a  re- 
sult so  unforeseen  and  deplorable,  but  so  it  was, 
and  he  could  only  tell  himself  that  after  a  tempo- 
rary separation  they  could  meet  again  with  all  the 
absurd  little  disagreements  of  the  past  few  weeks 
forgotten  by  Patrice,  and  only  remembered  by  him- 
self as  a  warning  to  exercise  greater  circumspec- 
tion in  his  future  relations  with  her  sensitive  and 
delicate  character. 


VI 

HENRY'S  reputed  destination  on  leaving  Beaufoy  at 
the  end  of  September  was  the  Earl  of  Wymond- 
ham's  house,  whither  he  had  been  invited  for  a  fort- 
night for  the  pheasant  shooting.  His  late  curious 
distaste  for  the  sport  had,  it  is  true,  entered  his 
head  once  or  twice  while  at  Beaufoy,  in  its  applica- 
tion to  his  forthcoming  visit,  but  he  had  not  made 
any  alteration  in  his  plans,  and  had  indeed  left 
Patrice  with  the  understanding  that  his  next  letter 
to  her  would  be  dated  from  Norfolk.  During  his 
return  by  motor  car  to  London  the  disinclination 
for  the  prospective  fortnight  grew  steadily  stronger. 
Apart  from  the  shooting,  Wymondham's  was  a 
dreadfully  dull  house.  Lady  Wymondham  was  still 
young  and  notoriously  handsome;  but  this  was,  as 
it  happened,  a  disadvantage;  for  it  had  the  effect 
of  causing  her  to  exclude  all  other  good-looking 
women  from  the  house;  and  as  she  had  already 
suited  herself  in  the  choice  of  a  confidential  male 
friend,  the  other  men  of  the  party  were  necessarily 
thrown  principally  on  each  other  for  amusement. 
If  one  shot,  all  was  well;  for  the  coverts  were 
among  the  best  in  England;  otherwise  a  fourteen 
days'  visit  was  likely  to  be  a  penitential  affair. 
Divided  between  the  disinclination  to  offend  and 

141 


142     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

the  indisposition  to  be  bored,  Henry  got  as  far  as 
causing  his  boxes  and  gun  cases  to  be  secured  at 
the  back  of  his  car  before  his  house  in  Cowley 
Street,  and  had  even,  wrapped  in  his  fur-lined  coat, 
watched  the  driver  set  the  engine  going,  before 
he  made  up  his  mind,  relinquished  the  steering 
wheel,  and  returned  within  doors.  His  butler  was 
informed,  to  his  almost  expressed  indignation,  that 
his  master  would  stay  in  London  for  the  fortnight, 
an  arrangement  which  entirely  threw  out  that  un- 
fortunate gentleman's  own  private  plans;  while 
Henry,  in  a  curiously  defiant  frame  of  mind,  sent 
a  lengthy  telegram  of  an  ingeniously  misleading 
nature  to  Lady  Wymondham,  robed  himself  in  a 
smoking  suit  and  settled  down  in  his  library,  over 
a  cigar,  to  a  serious  study  of  Shakespeare,  an  author 
to  whom  his  attention  had  recently  been  drawn  by 
Mrs.  Evans ;  and  of  whose  works  he  discovered  that 
his  previous  knowledge  was  largely  inherited  and 
hearsay. 

It  was  a  disgusting  day,  he  thought;  cold,  blow- 
ing and  wet;  and  he  hated  the  country  in  bad 
weather.  London  would  be  rather  fun  when  it 
was  empty;  a  novelty  at  least.  He  would  wear  a 
bowler  hat,  and  go  to  some  of  these  Exhibitions, 
and  take  part  in  the  people's  amusements;  descend 
water-chutes  and  switchbacks  in  the  company  of 
shrieking  shopgirls  and  facetious  clerks;  perhaps 
join  in  al  fresco  dancing,  or  cry  "  Ooooo !  "  at  daz- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     143 

zling  fireworks.  If  he  was  going  into  politics,  he 
should  know  something  of  the  proletariat.  In  the 
day-time,  there  were  short  motor  runs  to  be  made; 
walks,  too,  in  these  mysteriously  stimulating  en- 
virons of  the  great  town  —  ridiculously  scorned 
by  the  unwise  on  the  ground  of  their  overpower- 
ingly  impressive  desolation  and  vast  ugliness. 
And  while  he  was  in  London  he  might  —  by  Jove, 
yes !  he  had  almost  forgotten  that !  —  he  might  get 
that  portrait  finished  for  Patrice.  It  would  come 
well  as  a  peace-offering,  after  their  late  lover's 
quarrels ;  and  the  painter  was  sure  to  be  available. 
Poor  little  woman!  Probably  holidays  were  not 
very  frequent  with  her;  and  he  remembered  to 
have  heard  her  say  that  her  usual  time  for  her 
yearly  few  weeks  of  leisure  took  place  quite  early 
in  the  year;  in  May  or- June.  Besides  there  was  an 
originality  in  remaining  in  London  at  a  time  when 
most  of  his  set  were  away,  and  before  long  some 
of  his  friends  would  begin  to  reappear;  lots  of 
people  returned  now-a-days  before  October  was  out. 
He  contrived  in  this  manner  to  make  quite  a 
dissipation  of  his  loneliness;  dined  in  solitary  state 
at  the  Ritz  (he  had  half  a  mind  to  ask  that  poor 
little  painter  woman  to  join  him,  but  refrained  on 
remembering  that  she  had  some  sort  of  dietetic 
fads,  not  to  be  indulged  in  these  places  without 
surprise  and  trouble)  and,  as  the  rain  still  con- 
tinued, went  to  a  music  hall,  where  he  yawned  pro- 


144     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

digiously  over  trembling  performing  dogs,  frankly 
blackguard  and  ebrious  "  comedians "  and  stri- 
dent "  serios,"  until  bedtime  released  him  from 
their  exhibitions.  This  first  experience  almost 
made  him  repent  of  his  betrayal  of  his  word  to 
Wymondham,  but  the  next  morning  breaking  fine 
and  dry,  although  still  cold  and  windy,  he  rose  in 
renewed  good  spirits  and  set  out  on  foot,  by  way  of 
Grosvenor  Road  and  Chelsea  Embankment,  towards 
the  studio,  for  the  purpose  of  discovering  whether 
his  limner  was  at  liberty  to  continue  the  sittings. 

Half  way  along  the  embankment  he  unexpect- 
edly overtook  the  woman,  herself,  who  was  hold- 
ing forth  with  the  old  fluency  and  luxury  of  ges- 
ture to  an  intrusive  and  unacceptable  man-friend. 
Flora  was  at  first  hardly  recognisable  in  her  cold- 
weather  array  of  soft,  rough  frieze  ulster,  into  the 
deep  pockets  of  which  she  thrust  her  woolly-gloved 
hands,  whenever  they  were  not  required  for  the  pur- 
pose of  exposition.  The  garment  reached  to  her 
heels,  and  with  the  felt  "  gamin  "  hat,  from  under 
the  bent  brim  of  which  she  peeped  out  slyly,  gave 
her,  at  a  distance,  a  perplexingly  epicene  appear- 
ance. As  for  her  companion,  his  aspect  and  his  very 
presence  were  highly  displeasing  to  Henry,  who  was 
willing  to  associate  with  Flora  herself,  as  an  ex- 
ceptional member,  he  believed,  of  her  class,  but  had 
no  desire  whatever  to  be  brought  into  contact  with 
her  relations  or  friends.  This  fellow  was  not  a 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     145 

gentleman,  plainly,  in  even  the  widest  application  of 
the  term.  He  smoked  a  briarwood  pipe  and  wore 
a  rough  beard  of  nondescript  hue,  while  his  hair 
under  his  battered  hat  was  certainly  an  inch  and  a 
half  too  long.  In  spite  of  the  cold  of  the  day  he 
had  no  overcoat  and  his  dark  blue  flannel  shirt 
opened  in  a  low  collar  of  its  own  material  over  his 
hairy  throat.  Flora  introduced  him,  with  perfect 
aplomb  and  heartiness,  as  Mr.  Sutton,  and  the  ap- 
parition took  one  rough  hand  out  of  the  pocket  of 
his  worn  tweed  trousers  to  grip  Henry's  with 
quite  unnecessary  vigour.  "  Glad  to  meet  you," 
he  remarked  with  an  abrupt  and  gruff  unconcern, 
and  restored  his  hand  instantly  to  the  protecting 
pocket. 

Henry,  in  the  unexpectedness  of  meeting  Flora 
in  this  unwelcome  company,  had  more  than  half 
a  mind  to  pass  on  and  leave  the  pair  to  themselves ; 
but  the  cold  wind,  exercise,  and  the  surprise  of 
meeting  had  made  Flora's  pale  face  as  bright  as  a 
pink  rose,  and  her  eyes  and  lips  were  gay  with 
conversation  and  good-fellowship.  Somehow  he 
found  that  he  could  not  decide  to  part  from  her  so 
abruptly;  and,  to  his  surprise,  discovered  himself, 
after  a  few  moments'  halt,  falling  into  their  pace 
and  walking  with  them  towards  Chelsea  Church. 

"Well,  and  when  did  you  get  back?"  asked 
Flora.  "  I  needn't  ask  if  you  enjoyed  yourself," 
she  added  slyly. 


146     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  Only  the  day  before  yesterday.  I  meant  only  to 
pass  the  day  in  town,  but  I've  altered  my  plans; 
and  I  was  just  on  my  way  to  see  you,  to  ask  if 
you  could  go  on  with  the  picture." 

"  Are  you  going  to  stay  in  London,  then  ?  I 
thought  you  had  another  invitation?  " 

"  Yes.  I  made  an  excuse ;  I  didn't  feel  up  to 
it." 

"  Everywhere  else  seemed  flat,  naturally,  after 
Beaufoy  ? "  Flora  suggested,  peeping  up  at  him 
from  under  the  brim  of  her  hat. 

He  laughed  awkwardly,  not  from  any  shyness  in 
talking  of  his  engagement,  for  of  this  he  was  quite 
free,  but  from  a  guilty  knowledge  that  the  past 
few  weeks  had  not  been  altogether  the  success  that 
her  words  implied. 

"  And  besides  that,"  he  said,  eluding  the  sug- 
gestion, "  there's  nothing  to  do  but  shoot,  where  I 
was  going." 

"  But  that's  always  the  case  in  these  country 
houses,  isn't  it  ?  "  asked  Sutton.  "  You,  yourself, 
don't  shoot,  I  suppose?" 

"  I  haven't  been  doing  so  lately,"  Henry 
answered  rather  coldly;  for  he  resented  the  manner 
of  this  person,  who,  to  all  outward  seeming,  was 
no  better  than  a  tramp.  The  desire  to  commend 
himself  to  Flora,  however,  made  him  take  ad- 
vantage of  the  man's  question  to  explain  his  posi- 
tion further.  "  I  didn't  shoot  down  at  Beaufoy, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     147 

Mrs.  Evans ;  and  I  don't  feel  now  as  if  I  could  ever 
take  to  it  again." 

"Beaufoy?  Beaufoy?"  repeated  the  intrusive 
stranger.  "  That's  where  the  mantelpieces  are, 
isn't  it?  I  went  over  it  once,  I  think,  when  the 
family  was  away.  In  Wiltshire?  A  great,  solid 
house,  built  in  half-a-dozen  different  styles?" 

"  It  is  in  Wiltshire,"  answered  Henry  briefly, 
and,  turning  again  to  Flora,  he  continued: 

"  After  all  our  quarrels  about  sport  in  your 
studio,  I  found  I  couldn't  help  thinking  about  the 
subject,  and  as  a  result,"  he  added  laughing, 
"  you'll  be  pleased  to  hear  that  I  believe  you've 
robbed  me  permanently  of  a  great  pleasure." 

The  personal  influence  of  the  painter  in  his  al- 
teration of  view,  which  he  had  so  strenuously  denied 
in  his  private  communings,  he  found  himself  im- 
pudently insisting  on  to  the  woman's  face.  But 
then  the  face  was  a  lively  and  pretty  one  in  the  chill 
October  wind,  and  he  had  always  been  to  some  ex- 
tent the  slave  of  the  moment. 

"  But  that's  splendid ! "  cried  Flora,  pulling  a 
woolly  hand,  like  a  small  bear's  paw,  out  of  her 
pocket,  to  pat  Henry  approvingly  on  the  arm,  and, 
by  so  doing,  drive  the  colour  to  his  face  in  a  sud- 
den and  boyish  manner.  "  Mr.  D'Albiac  is  the 
most  reasonable  man  in  the  world,  Fred.  He  puts 
obstinate  persons  like  ourselves  to  utter  shame. 
One  only  has  to  suggest  an  idea  in  its  most  rudi- 


148     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

mentary  form  to  him  and  he  takes  all  the  labour 
of  excogitation  on  himself;  and  abides  by  the  re- 
sult in  a  really  heroic  manner.  First  the  suffrage, 
now  this  — " 

"Where's  the  heroism?"  asked  Sutton,  good- 
humouredly,  with  a  twinkle  of  his  deep-set  eyes. 
"  Being  converted  is  the  keenest  pleasure  in  life, 
especially  if  it  leads  to  a  renunciation." 

"  Converting's  greater !  "   Flora  insisted. 

"  Utterly  untrue,"  replied  Sutton  calmly.  "  Con- 
verting is  often  a  grievous  disillusion;  and  in  any 
case  it's  the  end  of  a  pleasure,  whereas  being  con- 
verted is  only  the  beginning  of  one.  Mr.  D'Albiac, 
I  declare  I  envy  you  the  privilege  of  having  only 
just  seen  the  objection  to  sport." 

"  But  it  makes  the  country  impossibly  dull," 
sighed  Henry,  still  a  little  flustered,  for  some  reason, 
at  the  touch  of  the  small  hand  on  his  arm. 
"  Country  houses  are  generally  heavy  enough,  with- 
out the  loss  of  one's  chief  amusement." 

"  Everywhere's  dull,  if  you're  idle,"  said  Sutton. 
"  The  country  is  endlessly  exciting,  if  you've  work 
to  do.  I  know;  for  I  worked  on  a  farm  for  eight 
years;  and  so  far  as  amusing  myself  went,  those 
were  the  best  years  of  my  life.  If  it  wasn't  for  the 
desire  to  help  the  machine  along  with  a  shove  or 
two  of  one's  own,  I  should  have  chosen  to  live  and 
die  there." 

"You  had  —  literary  work,  I  suppose  ?  "  asked 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     149 

Henry  politely,  surveying  the  figure  before  him,  and 
privately  thinking  that  it  would  be  a  likelier  sup- 
position that  he  was  employed  to  frighten  the  birds 
from  the  seed. 

"  No.  I  worked  in  the  fields ;  though  it's  true  I 
sometimes  wrote  in  the  evenings  for  my  own  amuse- 
ment. But,  as  a  rule,  I  was  far  too  tired  for  that. 
It  was  a  fine  life  for  a  beast;  and  I  know  now  how 
the  beasts  enjoy  themselves,  so  long  as  we  leave 
'em  alone.  But  I  can  imagine  what  it  must  be  like 
to  be  shut  up  in  a  country  house  with  nothing  to 
do.  Idling's  just  possible  for  a  time  in  towns,  if 
you've  lots  of  money;  but  in  the  country,  unless 
you're  an  exceptional  lover  of  nature,  it's  death  by 
inches;  and,  even  if  you  were  that,  you'd  probably 
turn  your  taste  into  work  at  last  by  becoming  a 
poet." 

"  Then,  as  far  as  I'm  concerned,  the  country's 
lost  its  attractions,  except  for  a  few  days  at  a  time," 
D'Albiac  agreed.  "For  I'm  afraid  my  friends 
would  be  a  little  amused  to  see  me  starting  off  for 
the  fields  with  a  spade." 

"  Well,  if  you  did  no  more  than  amuse  your 
friends,"  Flora  said  reflectively  "  you  'Id  have  done 
better  than  most  people.  But  I  think  you're  un- 
doubtedly a  town-dweller,  Mr.  D'Albiac;  and  be- 
sides you're  going  into  politics,  didn't  you  say?  " 

"In  our  country  or  your  own  ?  "  Sutton  enquired, 
with  an  obviously  increased  interest. 


150     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

Henry  gave  his  usual  brief  frown  at  the  discov- 
ery of  his  foreign  birth. 

"  I  don't  know,"  he  answered.  "  Probably,  how- 
ever, I  shall  live  largely  in  this  country  in  the  fu- 
ture." 

"  Will  he  be  any  use  to  us,  Flora  ?  "  asked  Sut- 
ton,  ruminatively.  "  Why  are  you  going  in?  For 
an  ideal  or  for  an  occupation  ?  " 

"  My  good  sir,"  Henry  remonstrated,  highly  re- 
senting the  speculative  eyes  of  the  man,  who 
seemed,  he  thought,  already  to  regard  him  as  a  fu- 
ture tool  for  his  own,  no  doubt  anarchic,  work. 
"I'm  not  yet  in  a  position  to  discuss  such  a  ques- 
tion. You  may  be  quite  sure  at  any  rate  that  when, 
or  if,  the  time  comes  I  shall  take  my  own  line.  I'm 
not  in  the  habit  of  accepting  my  marching  orders 
from  anyone." 

"  Flora,  this  is  your  responsibility,"  persisted  Sut- 
ton,  tastelessly.  "  Keep  hold.  Mr.  D'Albiac's  an 
enthusiast  and  young  and  plastic.  He's  got  brains, 
I  think,  he's  got  money,  I  suspect,  and  he's  got 
a  personality,  I  can  see.  Don't  let  him  go." 

Flora  laughed  at  Henry  to  dissipate  the  gathering 
glance  of  thunder  at  this  fellow's  insolence;  and 
he  found  himself  smiling  almost  affectionately  back 
at  her. 

"  Never  mind,  Fred,"  she  said  soothingly. 
"  He's  like  a  terrier  with  a  rabbit  when  he  scents  a 
potential  statesman.  You  shall  be  just  what  you 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     151 

like  in  politics  —  don't  be  alarmed :  a  Conservative, 
and  talk  about  appeals  to  the  base  passions  of  the 
proletariat,  and  appropriate  the  Union  Jack  and  the 
Navy  and  the  King  and  the  Empire  and  patriotism 
as  your  own  private  property;  or  a  Radical  and 
declare  yourself  to  be  the  only  party  that  ever  has 
done,  will  do,  can  do,  or  wants  to  do  anything  for 
social  reform;  or  a  Labour  member,  and  go  into 
Parliament  to  turn  it  upside  down,  and  afterwards 
troop  obediently,  on  all  occasions,  into  the  Radical 
lobby ;  or  a  Socialist,  and  —  what  do  they  do, 
Fred?"  she  asked  mischievously. 

"  Quarrel  with  all  the  other  socialists  on  earth, 
and  lose  chance  after  chance  of  getting  anything 
done,"  said  Sutton  regretfully.  "  And  here  we  are 
at  the  church.  I  must  be  off.  It's  past  twelve. 
Are  you  coming  my  way,  Mr.  D'Albiac?  " 

Henry  gave  quite  a  start  at  the  mere  notion  of 
walking  alone  through  the  streets  with  this  di- 
shevelled creature. 

"  What  are  you  going  to  do,  Mrs.  Evans  ?  "  he 
asked. 

"  I  was  going  back  to  get  on  with  some  work 
I've  got  in  hand;  but  if  you  like  to  have  a  sitting 
now,  I  can  give  you  one.  The  light's  pretty  good 
to-day,  and  that's  rare  at  this  time  of  year." 

"  Then  I'll  come  with  you,  if  I  may,"  Henry 
agreed. 

"  Good-bye,"  said  Sutton,  taking  both  hands  from 


152     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

his  pockets  for  the  first  time  and  giving  one  to  each 
of  his  companions.  "  Remember  what  I  said, 
Flora.  He  who  has  been  converted  once — .1  need 
say  no  more.  Hope  to  meet  you  again,  sir." 

He  nodded  with  a  twinkle  of  his  eyes  at 
D'Albiac,  put  his  hands  once  more  in  his  pockets, 
and  turned  back  again  along  the  embankment, 
while  Henry  and  Flora  pursued  their  way  up  the 
side-street. 

"  What  do  you  think  of  Fred  Sutton  ? "  asked 
Flora,  with  a  tilt  of  her  head  backwards  and  up- 
wards to  look  in  his  face. 

"  Well,  really  —  I  can  hardly  judge,  can  I  ?  " 
asked  Henry,  stiffly,  unwilling  to  give  his  true  opin- 
ion. "  He  struck  me  as  a  little  mad,  if  I  may  say 
so." 

"  Oh,  we're  all  that,"  agreed  Flora.  "  But  I  wish 
you  could  have  had  a  longer  talk  with  him;  he's 
a  most  stimulating  person."  To  allow  anyone  the 
power  of  stimulation  was  regarded  by  Flora,  it 
seemed,  as  the  highest  compliment  she  could  pay. 
"  And  then  he's  so  kind  and  nice.  I'm  very  fond 
of  Fred." 

"  I  didn't  mean  anything  uncomplimentary," 
Henry  urged,  anxiously.  "  Only  that  he  struck  me 
as  unconventional  —  eccentric.  I  hope  I  wasn't 
rude.  'He's  no  relation  of  yours,  is  he?  " 

"  Fred  ?  Oh,  no.  Just  a  friend.  You  wouldn't 
think  to  look  at  that  old  rag-bag  that  he  was  the 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     153 

son  of  a  rich  man,  would  you?  Well,  he  is;  and 
his  father  sent  him  to  a  public  school  —  I  forget 
which  —  Rugby,  I  believe.  He  —  the  father  — 
owned  a  lot  of  public-house  property,  and  Fred 
was  the  only  child.  He'd  have  been  worth  a 
good  many  thousands  a  year,  in  the  ordinary 
course.  However,  he  preferred  to  be  poor,  you 
see." 

They  had  reached  Mrs.  Evans'  house,  and  the 
painter  ran  upstairs  before  her  patron,  and,  throw- 
ing her  hat  and  ulster  on  a  chair,  hastily  indued  the 
toga  of  her  craft,  and  busied  herself  among  her 
brushes  and  pigments. 

"  Will  you  pose  yourself  and  look  pleasant 
please,  Mr.  D'Albiac?"  she  said,  abstractedly,  hunt- 
ing among  her  tubes.  "  The  light's  very  good  just 
now  and  we  mustn't  lose  it." 

"What  did  Mr.  Sutton  do  with  his  money?" 
resumed  Henry,  seating  himself  obediently.  "  Give 
it  away? " 

"  No,  because  he  never  actually  got  it.  Old  Mr. 
Sutton  wanted  to  send  him  to  Cambridge  when  he 
was  twenty,  but  by  that  time  Fred  had  got  ideas  of 
his  own;  and  he  told  his  father,  with  engaging 
frankness,  what  he  intended  to  do  in  life,  and  with 
the  public-houses  if  they  came  to  him.  You  can 
imagine  the  fury  of  the  old  publican!  So  Fred  got 
nothing,  and  the  money  went  to  a  cousin." 

"  How  did  he  manage  to  live?" 


154     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 


- 


"  Why,  for  a  time  he  worked  on  the  farm  of  a 
man  he  knew,  as  he  was  telling  you." 

"As  his  partner?" 

"  No,  as  a  farm  labourer ;  he  hoped,  you  see,  to 
be  able  to  find  time  to  write  as  well.  But  he  found, 
of  course,  that  he  was  becoming  a  vegetable  rap- 
idly; so  he  came  up  to  London,  with  a  few  pounds, 
and  got  reporting  work.  Of  course,  he's  rather  a 
striking  personality,  and  obviously  well  educated; 
and  as  he  was  willing  to  work  cheap,  he  didn't 
find  any  particular  difficulty  in  getting  a  job.  Oh! 
he's  done  most  things;  and  now  he's  on  the  staff 
of  Fraternity,  and  contrives  to  be  Secretary  to 
half-a-dozen  societies  as  well,  mostly  without  pay; 
and  he  lectures  and  organises.  I  feel  the  laziest 
creature  in  the  world  when  I  meet  Fred.  It  really 
makes  my  head  ache  to  think  of  all  the  things  he 
gets  through  in  a  day ;  and  yet  he  finds  time  to  keep 
up  his  friends  as  well.  For  instance,  he's  been  with 
me  a  couple  of  hours  this  morning;  but  then  he 
wasn't  in  bed  last  night.  Now  he'll  go  home  and 
sleep  for  an  hour  or  two,  and  then  be  at  work 
again.  And  they  say  that  overwork  kills  a  man! 
Look  at  Fred!  He's  all  of  fifty,  and  I've  never 
known  him  have  any  worse  disease  than  chilblains." 

"  Societies  ?  "  said  Henry,  reflectively,  when  the 
softly  tumbling  stream  of  words  ceased  for  a  mo- 
ment. "  What  sort  of  societies?  Is  he  an  anarch- 
ist?" 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     155 

Since  the  moment  of  their  meeting  he  had  de- 
cided that  Sutton  looked  exactly  as  he  had  always 
supposed  an  anarch  might  look,  although  he  was 
naturally  not  personally  acquainted  with  any  of  the 
brotherhood. 

"Heaven  forbid!"  ejaculated  Flora,  piously. 
"  Anarchy's  a  distant  dream.  He's  a  Social- 
ist." 

"  Well,  but  is  there  any  particular  difference  ?  " 
Henry  asked,  with  genuine  innocence;  for  he  could 
not  be  supposed  to  know  all  the  minor  distinctions 
of  these  social  pariahs. 

"  Only  this  difference,"  Flora  assured  him,  with 
the  smallest  of  smiles  as  she  regarded  his  disap- 
proving face,  "  that  they  hold  diametrically  oppo- 
site opinions.  Socialists  one  end  of  the  line,  An- 
archists the  other;  and  all  the  other  political  par- 
ties and  creeds  between  the  two,  with  the  old- 
fashioned  Liberal  nearest  to  the  Anarchist." 

"But  you're  not — ?"  he  began,  and  stopped; 
for  he  was  really  prepared  by  this  time  to  find 
she  was;  the  queer  woman  was  capable  of  any- 
thing. 

Flora  laughed  with  great  enjoyment. 

"  Socialist  ?  I  am,  though.  Poor  Mr.  D'Albiac ! 
I  see  you  looking  round  nervously  for  the  guil- 
lotine. That's  what  your  papers  tell  you  to  be- 
lieve, isn't  it?  That  we're  all  the  same  —  Anarch- 
ists, Socialists,  Communists,  Syndicalists  —  red 


156     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

caps,  c.a  ira,  tumbrils;  all  pickpockets  and  free  lov- 
ers—  generally,  the  Red  Peril;  words  of  grisly 
sound,  undoubtedly." 

D'Albiac  had  long  ago  realised  the  unwisdom  of 
provoking  Flora  Evans  to  tease  him;  and  knew  the 
only  way  to  avoid  the  tormentor  was  to  be  honest 
and  good-tempered.  Although  he  hated  being  de- 
rided, he  forced  himself  to  join  in  her  amusement, 
and,  with  a  lately-born  frankness  in  such  matters, 
confessed  his  comparative  ignorance  of  social 
science. 

"  Why,  of  course,  you  don't  know  anything  about 
it  at  your  age,"  Flora  said,  maternally.  "  After  all, 
most  people  get  through  their  entire  lives  in  abso- 
lute unconsciousness  of  how  their  neighbours  live, 
and  of  all  the  political  forces  that  are  at  work. 
Never  mind,  you  shall  have  a  free  course  of  lec- 
tures. I'll  get  Fred  to  come  up  here  sometimes 
when  you're  sitting,  if  he  can  spare  time,  and  tell 
you  all  about  it.  I'm  a  poor  exegete;  technical 
words  and  figures  and  dates  slide  off  my  memory 
like  butter  off  a  hot  plate,  although  I  believe  I'm 
sound  enough  in  principle.  But  Fred's  the  best 
prophet  I've  ever  met." 

This  was  a  lugubrious  prospect  for  Henry,  who 
discovered,  on  hearing  the  proposition,  the  truth 
that  he  had  successfully  hidden  from  himself  dur- 
ing the  last  few  days;  that  it  was  more  for  the 
pleasure  of  confidential  talk  with  the  artist  than 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     157 

with  the  idea  of  completing  the  portrait  that  he  had 
hastened  back  to  the  Chelsea  studio. 

Flora,  however,  was  pitiless. 

"  It'll  be  so  good  for  you,"  she  murmured, 
sweetly,  with  the  wicked  pouting  twist  of  her  mouth 
that  indicated  a  goblin  maliciousness  within. 

"  You  can't  expect  me  to  become  a  Socialist," 
protested  Henry,  feebly,  with  a  cold  fear  that  this 
dreadful  young  woman  was  capable  of  perverting 
him  even  to  these  monstrous  heresies,  unless  he  de- 
stroyed her  plot  in  embryo. 

"  For  he  had  great  possessions  ?  "  enquired  Flora. 
"  That's  a  quotation  from  a  book  that's  a  good  deal 
read  in  this  country.  You  wouldn't  know  it.  I 
admit  the  difficulty,  which  is  one  I've  never  had  to 
face,  luckily.  Still,  Mr.  D'Albiac,  I  put  great  con- 
fidence in  your  reason.  And  in  any  case,  you  may 
as  well  hear  our  arguments,  so  that  you  can  con- 
fute them  all  the  more  effectually,  later  on,  in  the 
House  of  Commons  —  or  is  it  to  be  Lords  ?  Per- 
haps that  would  be  more  distinguished  —  plus 
snob,  as  your  French  society  papers  say,  with  more 
truth  than  they're  aware  of." 

It  was  vain  for  the  unfortunate  D'Albiac  to  ppo- 
test  and  to  point  out  that  it  was  quite  uncertain 
that  he  would  ever  enter  politics,  and  that,  even  if 
he  did  so,  it  might  well  be  in  his  own  country, 
where  a  knowledge  of  English  Socialism  would  be 
comparatively  valueless.  Flora  only  smiled  ma- 


158     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

liciously  and  insisted  on  the  delights  of  opening  one's 
mind  on  all  subjects,  especially  when  so  able  a 
teacher  as  Sutton  was  available  gratis. 

"  The  principal  bar  to  progress,"  she  maintained, 
"  is  that  people  won't  listen ;  refuse  to  know  about 
things;  and  live  in  an  imaginary  world  of  their 
own  invention.  Neither  selfishness  nor  stupidity 
stops  the  world  half  as  much  as  that.  I  had  an 
elderly  woman  friend  who  assured  me,  with  evi- 
dent truth,  that  although  she  approved  of  all  the 
progressive  movements  and  revolutions  of  our 
past  history,  she  realised  that  we  had  now  reached 
a  point  when  the  civilised  world  was  about  as  well 
run  as  it  could  ever  hope  to  be;  and  any  further 
tinkering  at  it  could  only  have  a  bad  and  reaction- 
ary effect.  I  assure  you,  she  looked  at  me  without 
a  smile,  and  said  practically  those  very  words. 
She  lived  in  Tedworth  Square,  believed  the  poor 
were  a  pampered,  unthrifty,  and  importunate  race, 
and  that  rate-payers  were  the  only  people  to  be 
pitied.  She  thought  the  Poor  Law  was  a  triumph 
of  practicality  and  the  Public  Health  Acts  monu- 
ments of  sagacity.  She  couldn't  see  why  women 
wanted  a  vote,  when  men  were  so  kind  and  polite  to 
them,  and  did  everything  for  their  good  much  bet- 
ter than  they  could  do  themselves;  and  she  called 
herself  a  Liberal  —  I  forget  why ;  because  she  didn't 
like  titles,  or  admired  Gladstone,  or  was  a  Wes- 
leyan,  or  something  of  that  kind.  I  compelled  her 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     159 

to  save  her  soul  from  purification,  by  coming  with 
me  to  Somers  Town,  North  Kensington,  Lambeth 
and  Westminster  to  see  some  of  the  housing  of  the 
people  there;  and  I  showed  her  a  little  of  the  con- 
ditions of  women  workers.  It  literally  restored 
her  to  life;  she  looks  at  least  ten  years  younger, 
and  hasn't  had  a  single  one  of  her  customary  at- 
tacks of  nerves  since;  much  too  busy  to  bother 
about  it  if  she  had.  Just  fancy,  she'd  had  no  oc- 
cupation, before,  but  combing  her  Pom  and  driving 
out  in  a  victoria !  And  she's  a  Fabian  and  a  mem- 
ber of  my  branch  of  the  Union.  Mr.  D'Albiac, 
this  is  a  matter  of  your  personal  honour;  you 
wouldn't  like  me  to  think  you  were  frightened  of 
being  converted?" 

Thereafter,  Henry  never  knew  when  he  should 
find  Flora  alone.  Happily,  Sutton  was  unable  to 
abet  her  in  her  plans  for  a  day  or  two,  but  on  two 
occasions  Henry  found  himself  confronted,  on  ar- 
riving at  the  studio,  by  some  of  Mrs.  Evans' 
women  friends,  the  painter  evidently  considering 
that  by  this  time  she  knew  him  well  enough  to  stand 
on  no  ceremony  with  him.  Of  these  friends,  one 
was  a  sister  artist,  another,  a  robust  and  smiling 
elderly  person  of  nondescript  appearance,  who 
dropped  her  aspirates,  and  addressed  Flora  con- 
stantly as  "  mai  dear."  The  artist  he  could  en- 
dure; she  was  youngish  and  comparatively  inoffen- 
sive; but  the  older  woman,  besides  being  obviously 


160     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

of  very  low  class,  attacked  him  in  a  most  aggres- 
sive manner,  although  with  perfect  geniality,  on  the 
question  of  a  minimum  rate  of  wage  for  all  work- 
ers, and  drove  him  to  such  a  point  of  desperation 
that  he  was  within  an  ace  of  rising  and  fleeing 
from  the  unequal  field.  His  utter  ignorance  of 
facts  and  figures  hampered  him  in  these  discussions ; 
a  trifling  disability,  he  had  always  thought,  where 
one  has  a  mind  to  grasp  large  generalities.  All 
these  fantastic  people,  besides,  had  an  even  greater 
advantage  over  him,  which  was  doubtless  the  re- 
sult of  the  habit  of  strife;  that  they  kept  their 
tempers  unmoved,  while  he  found  his  tongue  stut- 
tering, his  face  inflamed  and  his  ideas  vanishing 
like  vapour  merely  from  the  detestation  of  being 
pressed  and  driven  into  corners.  Argument  of  so 
close  and  vigorous  a  kind,  a  outrance,  was  new  to 
him,  and  struck  him  as  extremely  discourteous; 
although  there  was  no  actual  fault  to  be  found 
with  the  mode  of  expression  or  the  tone  of  voice 
employed.  And  then  one  day  Sutton  reappeared, 
after  the  sitting  had  begun,  and  lying  back  in  an 
arm-chair  with  crossed  legs  and  waving  hands 
drowned  the  wretched  D'Albiac  in  a  flood  of  in- 
comprehensibly incontrovertible  speech.  The  un- 
happy young  Frenchman  was  one  of  those  persons 
who  refuse  to  admit  that  they  are  unacquainted 
with  any  subject  under  discussion;  who  interrupt 
with  a  cross  "  I  know  "  any  attempt  to  explain, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     161 

preferring  to  pick  up  the  meaning  by  degrees  out 
of  the  tangle  of  unknown  words  and  phrases  in 
which  they  writhe.  This  first  discussion,  or  rather 
monologue,  of  Button's  lived  in  his  mind  subse- 
quently as  a  sort  of  nightmare  of  confusion,  from 
which  emerged  scraps  of  speech  that  stuck  but 
half -understood  in  his  brain.  He  wallowed  des- 
perately among  a  welter  of  foreign  ideas  —  Rent 
(which  appeared  to  mean  almost  anything,  except 
what  he  had  always  heretofore  believed  it  to  mean)  ; 
Laisser  Faire ;  Final  and  Marginal  Utility ;  the  Law 
of  Indifference ;  Socialism  —  Marxian,  Fabian  and 
Utopian;  taxation  of  land  values;  social  minimum; 
the  endowment  of  motherhood;  exchange  value; 
Truck  and  Factory  Acts.  The  names  of  unheard- 
of  or  only  vaguely  remembered  people  were  hurled 
at  him,  with  an  assumption  that  he  was  quite 
familiar  with  their  social  beliefs;  an  assumption 
that  he  fostered  with  nods  and  impatient  "  I 
knows,"  as  Fourier,  Marx,  Spencer,  Ferri,  Stuart 
Mill,  Bebel,  Webb,  Owen,  Engels,  Ricardo, 
Jevons  and  half  a  hundred  others  were  discharged 
at  his  head,  like  shots  from  a  Maxim  gun.  After 
two  of  these  encounters  he  had  almost  decided  to 
visit  Flora  no  more;  and  yet  he  found,  oddly 
enough,  that  there  was  a  curious  interest  in  ex- 
ploring these  stony  and  thorny  by-paths;  he  con- 
ceived moreover,  in  the  stillness  of  night,  admir- 
able answers  which  he  might  have  used  to  the  utter 


162     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

confusion,  he  believed,  of  this  dogmatic  reformer. 
Perhaps  partly  with  this  forlorn  hope,  he  returned 
to  the  studio,  where  the  picture  was  by  this  time 
approaching  completion ;  and  had  a  ridiculous  sense 
of  momentary  disappointment  to  find  Mrs.  Evans 
alone,  and  all  his  carefully  dried  gun-powder  of 
no  value  to  him.  The  feeling  was  gone,  however, 
almost  as  soon  as  he  was  conscious  of  it;  he  had 
not  for  some  time  now  had  the  artist  to  himself; 
and  to-day,  fresh  and  fair  in  her  holland  over-all, 
with  the  pale  October  sunlight  gilding  her  brown 
hair,  she  seemed  to  be  in  a  reposeful,  unargumenta- 
tive  frame  of  mind,  encouraging  him  to  tell  her  of 
his  life  in  France  and  his  stately  home  there,  and 
abstaining  from  the  utterance  of  a  single  teasing 
word. 

Much  as  she  refreshed  and  amused  him  in  her 
talkative  moods,  Henry  was  yet  aware  of  a  new 
and  agreeable  feeling  towards  her  as  he  regarded 
her  this  morning,  and  idly  admired  the  pretty  hand 
that  held  the  long  brush,  the  gleams  in  the  soft 
hair,  and  the  little  smiles  and  dimples  that  gaily 
lit  up  her  alert  face  as  she  answered  him  or  helped 
on  his  confidences  with  suggestions  and  supposi- 
tions. He  did  not  care  to  analyse  this  feeling  too 
closely,  shyly  aware  that,  although  it  was  no  more 
than  friendship,  it  was  friendship  of  rather  an  un- 
usually tender  and  affectionate  kind.  There  was  no 
question  of  forgetfulness  of  his  Patrice,  or  any 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     163 

diminution  of  his  hunger  for  her  company  and  for 
the  day  when  she  would  become  his  own  for  ever; 
still,  Flora  Evans  had  undoubtedly  become  a  part 
of  his  life  that  he  would  be  loath  to  surrender;  and 
he  found  himself  falling  into  silence  as  he  contem- 
plated the  probability  of  Patrice  understanding  and 
appreciating  his  friend  when  he  introduced  them, 
as  in  time  he  must,  to  each  other. 

He  awoke  from  a  not  altogether  comfortable 
dream  to  find  the  painter's  dancing  blue  eyes  fixed 
on  him  curiously. 

"  You  musn't  look  quite  so  sentimental,  please, 
Mr.  D'Albiac,"  she  said,  "  or  I  shall  be  obliged  to 
repaint  the  whole  picture.  The  expression  I've 
caught  is  more  in  your  virile  and  defiant  manner. 
No  wonder,  poor  man,  after  the  people  I've  let 
loose  on  you.  Good  gracious,  who's  this?" 

The  exclamation  was  provoked  by  a  thundering 
galopado  on  the  rickety  staircase,  and  the  words 
were  hardly  out  of  her  lips  before  the  door  burst 
violently  open  and  Roddy  Chalmers,  in  a  bowler 
hat  and  a  polychromatic  overcoat,  was  precipitated 
headlong  into  the  room.  Conscious  of  another 
presence  besides  that  which  he  had  expected,  he 
pulled  up  short  with  a  panting  and  babbling 
apology. 

"I  say!  I'm  frightfully  sorry;  I  thought—" 
and  then,  realising  the  personality  of  the  sitter,  he 
emitted  a  shriek  of  delight  that  stunned  the  ears  of 


164     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

his  auditors.  "  Jools !  Old  Jools !  Having  his 
picture  took!  Oh,  you  scoundrel!  I  knew  you 
would;  I'd  have  bet  on  it!  Bad  luck  to  you! 
Look  at  his  old  face,  do !  Aaaah !  " 

And  pronouncing  the  last  word  in  a  minatory 
manner,  as  if  scolding  a  disobedient  retriever,  he 
threw  himself  into  the  armchair  and  rolled  about 
with  laughter;  while  D'Albiac,  hatefully  conscious 
of  flaming  cheeks,  made  a  desperate  effort  to  look 
entirely  at  his  ease  and  to  simulate  a  surprised  ig- 
norance of  his  friend's  meaning.  Flora  meanwhile 
contented  herself  with  smiling  in  a  careless  man- 
ner; for  she  was  impervious  to  innuendo  and  ir- 
rision  on  such  subjects. 

"  Don't  break  my  chair,  you  rough  creature,"  she 
said,  with  perfect  calmness.  "  It  isn't  strong 
enough  to  bear  much  of  that." 

"  Jools,  you'll  be  the  death  of  me  some  fine  day ; 
and  then  what'll  mother  say?"  said  Roddy,  wiping 
his  eyes  when  he  had  had  his  laugh  out. 

"  Don't  be  such  an  ass,"  Henry  protested,  smil- 
ing with  rather  ill  grace.  "  I  haven't  an  idea 
what  you  find  so  extraordinarily  funny,  I  must 
say." 

"  Not  a  notion ;  not  one,"  agreed  his  friend,  at 
the  top  of  his  quacking  voice.  "  Oh,  you  sweet 
innocent !  Never  mind,  I  won't  tell.  Not  a  word. 
The  grave'll  be  a  fool  to  me  for  silence.  Don't 
look  surprised,  Jools,  or  you'll  start  me  off  again, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     165 

and  next  time  I  shall  break  something  in  my  in- 
nards, I  know." 

"  Heaven  forbid  that  I  should  bring  on  any  more 
of  that  noise,"  Henry  said,  with  a  glad  knowledge 
that  his  face  was  cool  again  and  that  he  was  carry- 
ing it  off  rather  well;  although  mentally  he  was 
filled  with  irrational  fury  at  being  found  in  his 
present  situation.  Roddy  was  such  a  tattler;  quite 
innocently,  but  none  the  less  dangerously  for  that; 
and  he  wished  to  be  the  first  himself  to  tell  Patrice 
of  the  portrait  and  its  author.  It  was  hateful  to 
think  of  the  possibility  of  some  absurd  story  being 
previously  put  about  by  this  incorrigible  buffoon; 
and  yet  it  was  quite  impossible  to  let  him  believe 
that  there  could  be  any  reason  for  keeping  silence. 

"  Yes,  be  quiet,  Roddy,  please,"  Flora  asked,  sup- 
plicatingly,  "  and  tell  me  what  you  think  of  the 
picture." 

Chalmers  scrutinised  it  carefully;  first  between 
two  fingers,  then  through  a  sort  of  telescope  made 
by  closing  his  fist,  at  the  same  time  screwing  up  the 
unoccupied  eye.  He  put  his  nose  so  close  to  the 
canvas  that  Flora  was  obliged  to  tap  him  on  the 
end  of  it  with  a  paint-brush,  to  prevent  him  ad- 
hering to  it,  as  a  fly  to  a  fly-paper;  and  lastly,  re- 
treating backwards  with  indrawn  breaths  and 
broken  words  of  delight,  with  his  hand  shielding 
his  eyes,  in  the  endeavour  to  discover  the  best  dis- 
tance for  its  full  enjoyment,  he  walked  unawares 


166     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

into  a  hassock  and  fell  heavily  into  the  arms  of 
D'Albiac,  who  pushed  him  inhospitably  off  into 
the  armchair  again. 

"Wonderful!  Lifelike!"  he  exclaimed,  rap- 
turously, rolling  a  wild  eye  over  every  object  in 
the  room  except  its  human  occupants.  "  It  puts 
me  in  mind  of  those  birds  pecking  fruit,  that  dear 
old  Praxiteles  painted;  which  so  deceived  the  King 
of  Spain,  you  remember,  that  he  tried  to  shake 
hands  with  'em.  Flora,  you'll  have  to  keep  it 
dark,  or  the  Chantrey  people  will  buy  it  and  hang 
it  up  among  all  those  crusts  in  the  Tate.  No, 
seriously,"  he  added,  settling  his  face  into  gravity, 
with  one  of  his  sudden  attempts  to  recover  polite- 
ness, "  it's  ripping;  how  many  sittings  did  it  take?  " 

"  Oh,  quite  a  number,"  said  Flora,  painting  again 
now.  "  We've  had  such  a  lot  of  interruptions ; 
and  then  I've  talked  far  too  much,  so  it's  only  got 
on  slowly." 

"  You  lucky  dog,"  said  Chalmers,  shaking  his  head 
with  grave  disapproval.  "  You've  been  enjoying 
your  holidays  more  than  I  have,  mosire  le  markee. 
I  was  sick  on  that  beastly  yacht  every  day  but  one, 
and  then  she  was  aground.  And  here  are  you  cut- 
ting all  your  engagements  —  oh!  I  know!  But 
you  do  take  the  bun,  old  chap;  I  always  said  you 
French  fellows  did.  There!  I'll  never  mention 
it  any  more  as  long  as  I  live.  Don't  frown  on  me ; 
I  mean  well ;  and  after  all,  I  brought  you  here  first, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     167 

didn't  I?  As  for  you,  Mrs.  Flora  Evans,  you 
ought  to  be  ashamed  of  yourself." 

The  painter  was  wholly  unaffected  by  this  re- 
buke. 

"  It's  to  be  a  present  for  Miss  Beaufoy,"  she 
said.  "  I  do  hope  it's  a  success ;  I've  never  had 
such  an  important  commission  before." 

"  Of  course,  I'm  only  ragging,"  Roddy  thought 
it  necessary  to  remark  in  his  usual  phrase  of 
apology.  "  And  it  really  is  frightfully  like.  I 
should  have  known  at  once  who  it  was  meant  for, 
without  being  told  anything.  Well,  Flora,  I'm 
jolly  glad  to  see  you.  Have  you  been  away?  I've 
only  got  three  hours  in  London;  then  I'm  off  for 
Beaufoy,  Jools,  for  a  fortnight.  It's  all  right ;  I've 
given  my  word,  you  know,  and  no  man  ever  knew 
me  to  break  it.  Any  message  for  the  lovely  Miss 
Patrice?" 

D'Albiac  shook  his  head,  and  could  not  quite 
conceal  his  vexation  at  the  tasteless  joke  which 
Roddy  did  not  seem  to  know  when  to  drop.  Quite 
apart  from  its  offensiveness  to  himself,  it  was  surely 
very  embarrassing  and  rude  to  Mrs.  Evans,  and 
he  was  surprised  at  the  entire  impersonality  with 
which  she  received  these  coarse  sallies.  No  un- 
usual flood  of  colour  or  air  of  consciousness  or  an- 
noyance betrayed  her  distate  for  such  raillery,  if 
she  felt  any.  Absorbed  in  what  he  knew  was  quite 
unnecessary  perturbation  and  anger,  he  hardly  heard 


168     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

the  conversation  that  ensued,  though  he  was  dimly 
aware  that  at  times  it  concerned  himself ;  but  his 
two  talkative  companions  were  quite  unaware  of 
his  almost  complete  silence,  and  when  Roddy  re- 
membered with  a  hideous  bellow  of  laughter,  that 
he  had  missed  an  engagement  by  half  an  hour,  and 
tempestuously  took  his  departure,  he  was  quite  un- 
conscious that  he  had  not  made  himself  as  agreeable 
and  entertaining  to  Henry  as  his  amiable  intention 
was  to  be  on  every  occasion  to  all  his  fellowmen. 

"  Good-bye,  old  chap.  I'll  give  your  love  to  all 
of  'em  down  there,"  he  cried,  buoyantly,  and  then 
in  a  thrilling  whisper,  which  would  have  been  just 
the  thing  for  Alberich  in  "  Gotterdammerung,"  and 
at  the  same  time  pressing  his  hand  confidentially: 
"  Your  secret  is  as  safe  with  me  as  in  the  Charing 
Cross  Bank.  Good-bye,  Flora;  I'll  come  and  see 
you  as  soon  as  I'm  back  again.  Do  not  forget  me ; 
do  not  forget  me !  " 

The  last  words  sung  in  a  piercing  falsetto, 
reached  them  from  the  foot  of  the  stairs,  which  he 
had  taken  in  three  bounds;  and  fragments  of  the 
song  followed  his  retreat  up  the  passage  until  at 
last  he  turned  the  corner  into  the  street. 

"  What  a  lunatic ! "  laughed  Flora,  indulgently. 
"  Well,  Mr.  D'Albiac,  I  can't  do  any  more  to  it  to- 
day. But  the  next  sitting  ought  to  be  the  last." 


VII 

FOR  two  or  three  days  Henry  abstained  from  visit- 
ing Mrs.  Evans.  The  feeling  that  the  picture  was 
to  be  finished  at  their  next  meeting  made  him  anx- 
ious temporarily  to  hoard  the  day,  much  as  a 
school-boy  will  sometimes  cling  for  a  while  to  an 
unexpected  "  tip,"  loath  to  part  with  it  until  the 
full  savour  of  having  it  to  spend  at  his  pleasure 
has  been  pressed  out  and  degustated.  There  were 
moments  when  Henry  was  forced  to  perceive  that 
this  aspect  of  his  feelings  towards  the  painter  made 
them  appear  more  serious  than  they  ought  to  be, 
and,  of  course,  by  consequence  were.  But  for  all 
that  he  was  unwilling  to  get  the  sitting  over;  the 
last  of  those  many  talkative,  sometimes  annoying, 
but  always  retrospectively  good  mornings  that  he 
had  passed  in  the  cold  light  of  the  North  window. 
He  recalled  with  a  sentimentally  friendly  regret  the 
slight  figure  in  brown  holland  with  the  bright, 
tumbled  hair;  who  interspersed  her  outbursts  of 
volubility  with  long  silent  intervals  during  which 
she  worked  away  almost  unresponsively ;  the  con- 
stant occupation  of  her  eyes  preventing  her  from 
becoming  conscious  of  the  gaze  of  her  sitter,  who 
watched  her  ebbing  and  flowing  colour,  the  drolly 
contemplative  twist  of  her  delicately  pink  lips,  the 

169 


i;o     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

droop  of  her  long  white  neck,  and  the  movements 
of  her  graceful  hands,  with  what  was  doubtless  a 
purely  aesthetic  pleasure.  Even  those  friends  of 
hers  now  seemed  to  him  to  be  desirable  company. 
At  least  they  were  always  both  interesting  and  in- 
terested; the  weather  and  other  people's  private  af- 
fairs were  hardly  ever  mentioned;  nor  was  there 
that  constant  apathetic  enquiry  as  to  whether  one 
had  seen  the  last  new  book  which  is  apt  to  become  a 
little  worn  with  use.  Henry  felt,  too,  that  his  out- 
look on  life  was  enlarged  by  his  dialectic  encount- 
ers with  all  these  faddists,  who,  it  must  be  ad- 
mitted, were  inconveniently  well  informed.  Up  to 
the  present  he  had  proceeded  in  life  on  the  general 
principle  that  "  les  gens  de  qualite  savent  tout 
sans  avoir  famais  rien  appris":  but  in  his  argu- 
ments with  persons  who  appeared  unaware  of  the 
existence  of  gens  de  qualite  and  were  clad  in  a 
panoply  of  Board  of  Trade  Returns,  Parliamentary 
Blue-books,  County  and  other  Council  Reports,  and 
Public  Health  Statistics,  he  found  his  broad  philo- 
sophical views  of  life  often  awkwardly  upset  by 
facts  and  figures  which  he  was  unable  to  criticise 
and  dared  not  dispute.  The  feeling  of  humility 
thus  induced  had  driven  him  during  the  past  week 
or  two  to  a  course  of  reading,  the  last  that  he 
should  ever  have  anticipated  voluntarily  undergo- 
ing; and  he  grew  suspicious  that  some  of  his  most 
beloved  beliefs,  which  were  strictly  of  an  utilitarian 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     171 

and  individualistic  character,  were  beginning1  to 
show  signs  of  dilapidation.  Theoretically  they  ap- 
peared unassailable;  actually  one  found  that  they 
had  an  unaccountable  way  of  failing  one  at  critical 
moments;  and  the  lust  of  his  ratiocinative  French 
mind  to  find  a  reason  for  this  suspension  of  the 
laws  of  logic  made  him  anticipate  almost  with  de- 
sire that  company  which  at  first  he  had  found  in- 
supportable. However,  at  the  present  moment,  his 
mind  dwelt  chiefly  on  the  termination  of  his  peri- 
odical meetings  with  the  artist  herself.  Truly,  he 
might  in  future  consider  himself  to  be  enrolled  on 
her  visiting  list;  but  what  did  that  mean?  Twenty 
minutes,  half-an-hour's  talk,  in  the  presence  of 
other  people  perhaps,  once  a  month  or  so.  How 
should  that  satisfy  him  after  these  long,  confidential 
colloquies,  which  had  made  him  feel  that  he  knew 
Flora  Evans  as  well,  he  had  almost  said  better, 
than  anybody  else  now  living  in  the  world?  And 
he  could  hardly  ask  her  to  paint  another  portrait 
of  him. 

After  four  or  five  days'  absence  he  found  his 
solitude  unbearably  tedious  and  wrote  a  post-card 
to  'the  artist  to  make  an  appointment  for  the  next 
morning.  He  had  not  started  for  the  studio,  how- 
ever, when  a  telegram  was  brought  to  him,  thus 
regally  conceived: 

"  Come  and  see  me  at  once  Patrice." 

His  car  was  at  the  door  to  take  him  to  Chelsea; 


172     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

it  was  but  half-past  ten;  in,jtwo  hours  he  might  be 
at  his  lover's  home.  A  hasty  order  as  to  an  ex- 
cusatory telegram  to  Flora,  and  he  was  whirling 
away  westward  towards  Hounslow  and  Windsor, 
bound  for  Wiltshire. 

The  suddenness  of  his  summons  raised  no  fear 
or  anxiety  on  his  lover's  account  in  his  breast;  for 
he  was  not  one  of  those  swains  who  scent  disaster 
in  every  unexpected  absence  or  incomprehensible 
message  of  their  mistress.  Besides,  Patrice  Beau- 
foy  was,  as  he  well  knew,  delightfully  babyish  and 
princessly  in  these  matters;  distances  and  pre- 
vious engagements  did  not  enter  into  her  calcula- 
tions any  more  than  did  the  idea  of  expense;  not 
that  any  of  these  objections  could  of  course  be  sup- 
posed to  exist  in  the  case  of  a  devoted  fiance  with 
an  income  of  six  thousand  a  year  and  a  high-power 
car  at  his  disposal.  Still,  she  was  equally  capable 
of  ordering  the  attendance  from  London  of  an  ap- 
plicant for  a  maid's  situation,  without  any  partic- 
ular hope  of  employing  her  or  conception  that  there 
might  be  a  difficulty  over  the  train-fare.  Henry 
found  himself  smiling  over  the  sweetly  imperious 
ways  and  ignorance  of  sordid  detail  that  character- 
ised his  proud  beauty ;  but  the  next  moment  the 
smile  faded  a  little  at  the  memory  that  he  had  been 
culpably  remiss  in  his  correspondence.  The  pair  of 
lovers  were  not  much  addicted  to  communicating 
by  letter.  Henry  felt  he  lacked  the  necessary 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     173 

poetic  frenzy  to  reflect  the  depth  of  his  passion 
with  any  degree  of  accuracy;  and  Patrice,  besides  a 
natural  disinclination  for  the  incident  labour,  had 
certain  orthographical  misgivings  which,  although 
her  high  position  made  her  careless  of  exhibiting 
these  trifling  disabilities  to  the  ordinary  herd,  gave 
her  a  shy  unwillingness  to  run  unnecessary  risks  of 
exposing  herself  to  a  possible  smile  on  the  part  of 
her  lover.  Still,  they  had  been  in  the  habit  of 
writing  about  once  a  week  to  each  other,  and  it  oc- 
curred to  D'Albiac  with  a  remorseful  shame  that, 
save  for  a  rather  disingenuous  letter  written  and 
answered  within  a  few  days  of  his  return  to  Lon- 
don, he  had  made  no  attempt  lately  to  keep  in  in- 
timate relations  with  his  betrothed.  It  was  possi- 
bly this  that  caused  her  to  order  him  so  suddenly 
and  imperatively  to  her  side.  Or  could  it  be  that 

that    infernal    madman    ?     But    the    vistas 

opened  up  by  this  supposition  were  of  so  uncom- 
fortable a  nature  that  he  hastened  to  dismiss  it  as 
utterly  improbable;  particularly  in  view  of  the 
coarsely-expressed  and  wholly  supererogatory  as- 
surances of  discretion  that  had  been  so  repeatedly 
given. 

The  morning  was  dull,  rain  threatened,  and 
D'Albiac  felt  a  chill  both  spiritual  and  physical  as 
he  urged  his  vast  and  panting  steed  through  Staines, 
Ascot  and  Wokingham,  at  a  pace  which  made  even 
his  driver,  whose  own  licence  presented  quite  an 


174     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

interesting  display  of  magisterial  autographs, 
glance  occasionally  at  his  employer's  face,  as,  blind 
to  warning  notices  and  the  mystic  salutations  of 
the  Automobile  Association's  myrmidons,  he  held 
on  his  breathless  course.  The  watery,  motionless 
clouds  hung  low  and  melancholy  in  swathe  after 
swathe  of  solemn  veiling  over  the  greater  part  of 
the  sky.  Away  to  the  south  there  was  still  a  patch 
of  pale,  spiritless  blue,  already  threatened  by  the 
surgent  form  of  a  gigantic  and  massive  nimbus  that 
slowly  raised  its  grey  head  and  shoulders  from  the 
hard  sky-line.  Henry,  always  acutely  susceptible 
to  the  influence  of  weather  and  surroundings, 
found  his  spirits  so  lugubriously  affected  by  this 
characteristically  British  morning  that  he  devel- 
oped at  last  quite  a  childishly  nervous  anticipation 
of  his  forthcoming  meeting  with  Patrice.  It  was 
vain  to  reason  with  himself;  to  say  that  probably 
the  summons  was  the  mere  caprice  of  a  loving  child ; 
and  that,  in  any  case,  he  had  done  nothing  shame- 
ful or  inexplicable  to  a  heart  that  beat  so  wholly 
with  his  own  —  at  least,  not  lately.  The  black 
mood  persisted,  notwithstanding,  growing  darker 
still  as  heavy  drops  began  to  patter  on  the  car  from 
the  comfortless  sky,  and  by  the  time  he  had  reached 
the  lodge  gates  of  Beaufoy  he  had  so  worked  upon 
his  nervous  system  that  he  caressed  a  wild  mo- 
mentary idea  of  turning  the  motor  back  in  the  di- 
rection whence  it  came,  and  of  sending  some  at 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     175 

present  unimaginable  telegram  of  excuse;  or  of 
hastening  down  forthwith  to  his  friends  in  Nor- 
folk, there  to  beg  hospitality  for  sufficient  time  to 
write  a  letter  of  anxious  regrets  to  his  lover. 

The  stately,  age-worn  front  of  the  big  house, 
which  he  had  so  often  admired,  struck  him  to-day, 
as  he  flew  towards  it  up  the  long  lime  avenue,  as 
merely  depressing  and  of  Pentonvillian  aspect, 
looming  grey  and  solid  through  the  drive  of  the 
rain.  No  one  was  visible  about  the  place  as  he 
drew  up  at  the  door,  although  he  heard  the  distant 
sound  of  a  piano.  Even  his  former  acquaintance, 
the  butler,  seemed  to  Henry's  excited  fancy  to  wear 
an  aspect  several  shades  more  funereal  than  usual, 
in  admitting  him;  and  at  the  best  of  times  his  was 
not  a  jocund  presence.  Indeed  D'Albiac  had  for- 
merly registered  a  vow  that  he  would  find  some 
plan  to  prevent  this  valuable  servant  marring  the 
future  wedding  festivities  by  his  attendance ;  as  a 
croque-mort,  thought  Henry,  he  would  be  highly 
impressive:  and  it  Would  be  better  to  keep  him  in 
reserve  for  any  possible  occasion  when  his  services 
in  that  capacity  might  be  required,  rather  than  waste 
him  upon  scenes  of  thoughtless  gaiety. 

"  Miss  Beaufoy  told  me  to  show  you  into  her 
room,  as  soon  as  you  arrived,  sir,"  he  said  gravely. 
Of  course,  Morrison  was  always  grave,  as  Henry 
well  knew;  yet  the  solemnity  of  his  manner  seemed 
on  this  occasion  undesirably  portentous ;  and  Henry 


176     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

followed  his  muffled  footsteps  to  Patrice's  boudoir 
with  much  the  feeling  'of  a  guilty-minded  school- 
boy who  approaches,  by  special  request,  the  study 
of  his  pedagogue. 

Left  alone  in  the  luxurious  little  room,  he  vainly 
endeavoured  to  steady  himself  and  banish  his  cause- 
less perturbation  by  the  perusal  of  one  or  two  illus- 
trated magazines  that  lay  about  the  tables  and  sofa : 
and  the  resultant  impression  of  a  dentist's  waiting- 
room  grew  so  strong  that  a  distinct  sense  of  un- 
easiness made  itself  felt  in  his  peculiarly  sound 
teeth.  He  chafed  and  fumed  inwardly  at  this  soli- 
tary interval;  it  did  seem  to  him  that  his  lover 
might  realise  his  anxiety  at  receiving  such  an  abrupt 
order,  and  might  in  pity  lose  as  little  time  as  possi- 
ble in  assuring  him  that  there  was  nothing  seri- 
ously wrong.  By  degrees  his  irritability  began 
even  to  get  the  better  of  his  pusillanimity,  and  he 
was  on  the  point  of  ringing  the  bell  to  enquire 
whether  his  arrival  had  been  announced,  when  the 
door  opened  and  Patrice,  in  an  exquisitely  draped 
dress  of  dark  violet  silk  —  a  royal  mourning  robe, 
one  would  have  said  —  with  her  sunset  hair  au- 
daciously bound  in  a  broad  violet  ribbon,  swept 
with  her  usual  slow  grace  into  the  room.  Henry 
sprang  to  his  feet  and  hastened  towards  her,  with  a 
desperately  unsuccessful  attempt  to  appear  quite 
natural  in  his  attempt  to  take  her  in  his  arms,  and 
to  manifest  startled  surprise  when  she  lifted  her 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     177 

hand  with  a  gesture  of  proud  refusal.  Patrice  was 
paler  than  usual,  and  she  hardly  raised  her  eyes  as 
Henry  seized  and  kissed  the  extended  hand;  al- 
though her  proud,  full  lips  drooped  into  a  deeper 
pathos. 

"  Patrice !  Darling !  Why  —  what  have  you  — 
is  anything  wrong? "  he  stammered.  "  No  bad 
news?  Your  mother — ?" 

It  naturally  did  not  occur  to  him  to  enquire  after 
the  health  of  Ivan,  who  was  Patrice's  only  other 
close  relation. 

She  shook  her  head  a  little,  and  sat  down  in  si- 
lence in  the  deep  embrasure,  resting  one  rounded 
arm  on  the  window-ledge  and  presently  lifting  her 
eyes  to  stare  sightlessly  out  at  the  rain-veiled  land- 
scape. To  Henry's  anxious  scrutiny  it  seemed  as 
if  the  lower  eyelids  were  strangely  pink,  and  there 
was  certainly  faint  shadows  beneath  them. 

"  You're  not  ill  yourself,  my  beloved?  "  he  asked, 
seizing  her  hand  frantically,  and  his  heart  sinking 
more  and  more  as  she  gently  disengaged  it  and  re- 
peated the  slight  shake  of  her  head.  Plainly  he 
must  await  her  pleasure  in  speaking;  and  he  sat 
down  beside  her  in  the  window-seat,  gazing  anx- 
iously on  her  pale,  spiritless  face  and  downcast  eye- 
lids. 

"  Tell  me,"  he  said  presently,  in  a  pleading  under- 
tone. 

The  rain  pattered  in  great  soft  tears  on  the  stone 


178     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

window-ledge,  and  the  flames  of  a  small  fire  flapped 
their  yellow  sails  in  the  grate;  otherwise,  except 
for  the  beating  of  his  own  heart,  Henry  swam  in  a 
cold  grey  silence;  for  the  little  china  clock  on  the 
mantelpiece,  a  prey  to  the  general  sense  of  depres- 
sion, registered  half -past  five  with  the  unblushing 
and  obstinate  mendacity  of  despair.  Perhaps  it 
realised  the  overuse  to  which  its  brethren  had  been 
put  in  scenes  of  this  kind  as  described  by  modern 
writers,  and  scorned  to  pander  to  the  prevailing 
taste  for  its  rapid  and  insistent  tick  to  fill  out  the 
pauses  in  the  dramatic  action;  or  perhaps  it  feared 
to  enhance  the  gloom  by  a  reminiscent  suggestion 
of  death  and  transfiguration.  At  least  it  was  si- 
lent. Presently  Patrice  withdrew  her  eyes  from 
the  window,  and  passing  them  transiently  over 
Henry's  anxious  face,  dropped  them  on  the  gener- 
ously abundant  advertisement  pages  of  the 
Strand  magazine,  which  she  picked  up  from  the 
seat  beside  her.  The  picture  which  she  contem- 
plated represented  a  medical  belt  of  surprising  prop- 
erties, and  the  lurid  flashes  of  forked  lightning, 
which  it  apparently  generated,  seemed  to  her  lover 
to  bear  almost  a  prophetic  significance. 

"  Henry,"  she  said  in  a  level  voice,  after  an- 
other pause,  "  I've  had  some  news  that  surprised 
me  —  rather." 

"News?  Of  what?"  asked  D'Albiac,  conscious 
that  his  heart  was  making  itself  vulgarly  obtrusive. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     179 

"  Of  you,"  said  Patrice,  studying  intently  the 
unusually  plain-spoken  panegyric  of  a  member  of 
the  Peerage  (modestly  represented  by  a  single  ini- 
tial) of  the  almost  miraculous  curative  powers 
which  the  belt  had  manifested  in  his  own  extremely 
grave  and  unappetising  case. 

"  Me?  "  cried  Henry,  throwing  up  his  head,  with 
lifted  eyebrows. 

The  girl  frowned  a  little  at  his  tone,  before  re- 
lapsing into  her  former  expression  of  pretty  and 
babyish  discontent. 

"Yes.     Roddy  Chalmers— " 

D'Albiac  gave  an  uncontrollable  movement  of 
rage;  and  his  thoughts  were  for  a  second  couched 
in  language  that  would  have  completed  his  disgrace 
in  Patrice's  eyes,  had  he  given  them  expression. 
That  miserable,  leaky  gasbag!  That  wretched 
zany  with  his  idiotic,  vulgar  jokes,  and  perversions 
of  the  truth!  It  was  as  he  had  feared;  the  sacred 
cretin  had  poisoned  his  lover's  mind  with  his  base- 
minded  aspersions. 

" — is  down  here,"  Patrice  was  continuing,  in 
the  same  level  tones.  "  You  know  that,  of  course. 
He  told  us  that  he'd  seen  you  in  London  a  day  or 
two  ago." 

She  broke  off  again,  her  lips  moving  noiselessly 
as  if  seeking  for  words  to  continue ;  but,  apparently 
finding  none,  she  turned  to  a  fresh  page  of  her 
magazine,  whereon  was  presented,  with  truly  pain- 


i8o     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

ful  realism,  the  depiction  of  a  moustached  and 
comely  man,  clasping  his  hand,  with  a  gesture  and 
expression  of  extremest  agony,  to  the  base  of  his 
spine,  while  a  modish  feminine  sympathiser  re- 
garded this  sudden  and  violent  disorder  with 
clasped  hands  and  dilated  eyes  of  concern.  In  the 
background,  a  motor-car  of  unusual  design  awaited 
them,  and  beneath  the  picture  the  legend  "  Every 
picture  tells  a  story  "  was  exhibited  in  heavy  leaded 
type.  It  appeared  to  Henry  that  it  was  about  to 
become  incumbent  on  himself  to  emulate  the  ex- 
ample thus  suggested  to  him;  but  his  ignorance  as 
to  the  extent  of  Roddy's  revelations  made  him  cau- 
tious and  laconic  in  his  first  reply. 

"  Yes.  We  ran  up  against  each  other,"  he  ad- 
mitted with  a  rosy  carelessness.  A  feeling  of 
amazed  shame  at  his  own  aversion  from  telling  his 
lover  the  whole  truth  instantly  filled  his  mind;  and 
yet  he  knew  that  he  had  not  the  necessary  courage 
to  undertake  what  theoretically  was  a  perfectly 
simple  and  comprehensible  task.  There  had  been 
no  harm  in  his  past  behaviour,  there  could  be  no 
danger  in  describing  it;  but  he  was  uncomfortably 
aware  that  he  had  been  acting  lately  as  if  some 
harm  existed,  and  that  by  this  stupidity  he  had  cre- 
ated an  atmosphere  of  suspicion  for  which  there 
was  no  real  cause,  but  which  was  none  the  less  diffi- 
cult to  dissipate. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     181 

"  I  thought  you  were  going  to  Norfolk,"  Patrice 
continued,  in  the  same  low  tones. 

"  I  told  you,  darling,"  said  Henry,  "  in  my  let- 
ter—" 

"  You  told  me  that  you  were  not  going  down  for 
a  day  or  two;  and  I  naturally  thought  that  you 
meant  that,  after  that,  you  were  going.  Since 
then  you  haven't  written  to  me  again." 

Poor  Henry  searched  his  brain  hastily  for  some 
explanation  of  his  epistolary  silence,  trying  to  per- 
suade himself  that  it  had  not  been  due  to  the  fact 
that  he  had  wished  Patrice  to  remain  unaware  that 
he  still  lingered  in  London,  and  failing  in  the  at- 
tempt. 

"  I  can't  write  letters  to  you,  you  know  that,"  he 
cried  passionately.  "  I'm  a  good  correspondent 
with  my  ordinary  friends  and  relations  "  (this  was 
wholly  imaginary,  although  for  the  moment  he  be- 
lieved it  to  be  a  fact)  "  but  I  can't  put  down  on 
paper  what  I  feel  for  you,  Patrice.  You  know 
we've  both  felt  the  same  about  that.  Love's  a  thing 
that—" 

Miss  Beaufoy  seemed  unmoved  and  unconvinced 
by  this  outburst,  despite  its  ring  of  strong  emotion, 
and  took  her  privilege  of  interruption. 
"  Why  didn't  you  go  to  Norfolk?  " 
He  moved  uneasily  in  his  place  at  the  revival  of 
this  question  and  answered  rather  irritably: 


182     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  Wymondham's  such  a  bore.  I  felt  at  the  last 
moment  I  couldn't." 

:<  You  might  have  sent  me  a  line  to  say  you 
weren't  going,"  said  Patrice.  "  Maman  wrote  to 
Lady  Wymondham  the  other  day  enclosing  a  mes- 
sage to  you  in  the  letter.  They'll  think  it  very  ex- 
traordinary that  we  shouldn't  know  where  you 
were." 

"  I'm  awfully  sorry,"  Henry  stammered  feebly, 
all  his  social  tact  and  contrivance  deserting  him. 
"  I  meant  to  let  you  know ;  I'm  afraid  I  forgot. 
But  you've  had  experience  of  how  dull  their  house- 
parties  are." 

"  You  knew  that  when  you  accepted,  didn't 
you  ?  "  asked  the  girl,  curiously  contemplating  an 
indifferently  reproduced  photograph  of  a  turbaned 
mystic,  dusky  of  complexion,  although  otherwise 
Britannically  metropolitan  of  countenance,  point- 
ing his  forefinger  directly  out  of  the  picture  at  the 
spectator,  and  subscribed  with  the  question :  "  Do 
you  know  this  man?"  No,  indeed,  thought 
Patrice;  she  was  beginning  to  realise  that  she  did 
not,  and  never  had. 

"  Of  course,"  Henry  replied,  laughing,  with  a 
valiant  attempt  to  carry  the  matter  off  with  a  little 
more  lightness.  "  But  I  had  a  sort  of  wave  of 
realisation  of  those  dreadful  evenings  at  Wymond- 
hams ;  and,  besides,  I  heard  that  the  shooting  wasn't 
as  good  as  usual  this  year  down  there." 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     183 

Miss  Beaufoy  looked  up  quickly,  and  he  had  a 
conviction  that  in  his  anxiety  to  make  his  peace  he 
had  said  too  much. 

"  So  that's  why  you  didn't  go  ?  "  she  asked,  with 
suspicious  calmness;  and  Henry  in  view  of  his  pre- 
vious remarks  was  obliged  to  assent. 

"  Why  did  you  give  —  other  people  quite  a  dif- 
ferent reason?"  Patrice  enquired.  Her  eyes  had 
again  fallen  to  the  contemplation  of  the  occultly- 
gifted  Oriental,  so  that  she  was  not  actually  a  spec- 
tator of  the  falling  chaps  and  burning  complexion 
of  her  lover. 

"Why  did  I — ?"  he  repeated  miserably. 

Patrice  broke  in  with  the  first  touch  of  anger 
that  she  had  shown ;  and  her  pallor  became  warmer, 
although  she  still  did  not  look  up. 

"  Roddy  Chalmers  told  us  all  at  dinner  last  night 
that  he'd  been  told,  by  someone  who  knew  you,  that 
you'd  become  converted  to  some  ridiculous  anti- 
sport  ideas,  and  that  you  wouldn't  go  anywhere 
now  where  you  were  expected  to  shoot.  You 
know  what  he's  like.  He  shouted  it  out  before  all 
the  table,  and  turned  you  into  a  perfect  laughing- 
stock. I  hate  that  man ;  I  can't  think  why  Maman 
invites  him.  But  I  believe  what  he  said;  you 
showed  signs  of  it  when  you  were  down  here;  that, 
and  other  stupid  fads  that  you'd  never  had  until 
then.  But  naturally  I'd  no  suspicion  then  of 
the  cause  of  them.  I  couldn't  have  had,  Henry; 


1 84     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

it    wouldn't    have   occurred    to    me   as    possible." 

Her  voice  suddenly  dropped  and  had  a  sound  of 
tears  in  it  which  terrified  and  distressed  D'Albiac 
beyond  measure. 

"  Cause  ? "  he  repeated  vacantly,  without  a 
notion  of  what  he  could  say  to  exculpate  himself 
and  comfort  his  betrothed. 

The  tears  vanished  as  suddenly  from  Patrice's 
voice  as  they  had  appeared. 

"  You  haven't  spoken  the  truth  to  me,"  she  said, 
looking  at  him  proudly.  "  You've  purposely  kept 
me  in  the  dark  as  to  where  you  were.  I'm  not  go- 
ing to  talk  round  and  round  the  subject  any  longer; 
though  I  wanted  to  give  you  a  chance  of  being 
frank  about  it,  if  you  liked  to  be.  But  I  know  now 
that  I  can't  trust  you;  you've  only  been  trying  to 
get  out  of  it  without  telling  me  anything,  because 
you  didn't  know  how  much  I'd  heard." 

She  flung  the  accusation  at  him  with  a  tone  of 
scorn  that  awakened  Henry's  easily  stirred  anger 
in  a  flash.  The  tone  of  bitter  reproach,  he  felt, 
was  not  justified  by  anything  that  he  had  done; 
nor  would  he  consent  to  be  lectured  as  if  he  was  a 
child  who  had  been  found  out  in  some  deceitful 
mischief. 

"Heard?  About  what?"  he  asked  coldly. 
"  I'm  surely  at  liberty  to  stay  away  from  — " 

"Henry!  How  can  you?"  cried  Patrice  pas- 
sionately, with  tears  starting  into  her  big,  dark 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     185 

eyes.  "  When  I  tell  you  that  Roddy  Chalmers  has 
told  me  all  about  that  woman!" 

"What  did  he  dare  to  say  about  me?"  burst 
out  Henry  in  a  fury,  with  a  face  of  crimson  and 
blazing  eyes.  "  And  how  can  you  listen  to  a  man 
you  know  to  be  a  scandalmonger  —  a  stupid 
farceur;  practically  an  idiot — " 

"  Do  you  deny  it?"  Patrice  replied,  as  angry  as 
himself,  although  shrinking  a  little  before  the  vio- 
lence of  his  expression.  "  Do  you  deny  that  you 
have  been  every  day,  nearly,  associating  with  some 
dreadful  creature?  And  that  it  was  only  to  be 
with  her  that  you've  been  hiding  in  London  all 
these  weeks  ?  " 

The  knowledge  that  they  were  confronting  each 
other  face  to  face  like  a  pair  of  furious  children 
suddenly  restored  Henry's  self-control,  and  he 
paused  a  moment  before  replying  in  more  conven- 
tional tones: 

"  Hiding's  a  word  that  you'll  be  sorry  you've 
said,  I'm  sure,  when  you  think  over  it  later.  And 
I  can't  allow  any  friends  of  mine  —  any  people  I 
think  fit  to  associate  with  —  to  be  spoken  of  as 
'  dreadful  creatures  ' —  no,  Patrice,  not  even  by 
you.  The  reason  I  didn't  go  to  Wymondham's 
house  was  the  one  I've  given  you ;  and  there  was  no 
other.  But  you've  heard  a  wickedly  perverse  ac- 
count of  something  that  I've  been  doing  for  you  — 
for  you,  Patrice  —  in  London,  while  I  was  left 


1 86     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

there  by  myself;  and  you'll  surely  be  just  enough 
to  let  me  give  you  my  own  version  of  it." 

"  I  gave  you  every  chance,"  Patrice  replied, 
dropping  her  eyes  on  her  magazine  and  carefully 
scrutinising  an  unsolicited  promise,  apparently 
made  by  an  insane  millionaire,  to  award  solid 
eighteen-carat  "gold-filled  Alberts"  (whatever 
these  may  be)  to  all  members  of  the  public  who 
would  take  the  small  trouble  of  writing  to  ask  for 
them.  "  I  gave  you  every  chance ;  and  you  only 
tried  to  pretend  you  didn't  know  what  I  meant." 

Henry  felt  his  anger  surging  up  in  a  fresh  tumult 
at  the  words,  but  being  unable  conscientiously  to 
deny  the  implication,  he  sat  silently  swallowing  his 
wrath,  with  actual  physical  actions  of  the  throat, 
for  some  moments  before  he  was  able  to  pro- 
ceed. 

"  If  you  'Id  let  me  speak  — .  I  do  think  I'm  en- 
titled to  explain;  and  I  am  surprised,  Patrice,  that 
you  should  accept  as  true  the  statement  of  a  fellow 
like  Chalmers,  without  hearing  what  I  have  to  say 
on  the  subject.  I  thought  you  had  more  trust  in 
me  and  sympathy  with  me  than  that." 

His  voice  fell  in  a  pathetically  appealing  full 
close;  but  Patrice,  with  a  firmness  that  struck  him 
as  being  a  little  obstinate,  continued  to  study  her 
advertisements  in  silence. 

"  When  I  was  in  town  this  summer,"  began 
Henry,  with  a  cautious  deliberation,  and  a  pause 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     187 

between  every  two  or  three  words,  "  I  happened  to 
meet  this  —  this  lady  you've  referred  to  — " 

"  Where?"  asked  Miss  Beaufoy,  lifting  her  eye- 
brows but  not  her  eyelids,  and  speaking  in  a  cold 
tone. 

D'Albiac  could  hardly  say  "  In  a  row,"  and  the 
nature  of  the  disturbance,  so  far  from  being  any 
excuse  for  it  in  his  lover's  eyes,  would,  he  was  well 
aware,  only  make  it  more  distasteful  to  her.  He 
raised  his  hand  in  a  deprecatory  gesture  of  en- 
treaty. 

"  Shall  I  just  tell  you  the  whole  story  first  without 
questions,  darling?  Otherwise  we  shall  get  so 
mixed.  I  just  ran  across  her  somewhere,  I  don't 
exactly  " —  his  voice  fell  into  an  inarticulate  mur- 
mur, and  then  sprang  to  a  higher  tone  and  greater 
strength  to  continue :  "  And  it  appeared  she  was  a 
portrait  painter  —  quite  a  well-known  one,  I  be- 
lieve; Chalmers  knows  all  about  her.  It  occurred 
to  me  —  we  got  talking  about  pictures,  and  so  on 
< —  I  thought  — .  Of  course,  I  mean  to  say,  one 
usually  has  to  pay  such  enormous  prices  for  por- 
traits that  unless  one  is  very  pleased  with  one's  ap- 
pearance," he  laughed  at  the  words,  with  a  hope- 
ful glance  at  Patrice's  immovable  face;  and  it  was 
strange,  he  thought,  that  he  had  never  noticed  be- 
fore what  a  sulky,  almost  heavy,  expression  those 
full  red  lips  could  take  in  displeasure.  "  Unless  one  is 
pretty  vain,  you  know,  it's  hardly  to  be  thought 


188     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

of,  except  by  millionaires.  It  struck  me  that  it 
would  be  a  surprise  for  you  that  you  'Id  like,  as 
you're  so  fond  of  Art,  to  have  a  good  portrait  done 
of  myself  as  a  present  to  you;  and  here  was  a  chance 
of  getting  one  on  the  spot;  and  at  such  a  price 
that  it  didn't  much  matter  if  it  railed.  So  I  gave 
this  —  this  —  Mrs.  Evans  her  name  is  —  a  sitting 
or  two,  before  I  came  to  stay  here ;  and  when  I  de- 
cided not  to  go  to  Wymondham's,  having  nothing 
to  do  in  London,  it  was  obviously  a  good  time  to 
get  the  thing  over  and  done  with,  before  you  came 
back  to  town;  so  that  the  present  would  be  ready 
for  you  by  Christmas.  That's  literally  all  that  has 
happened  —  just  a  few  sittings.  But  that  imbecile 
Chalmers  happened  to  come  to  her  studio  when  I 
was  there,  and  naturally  thought  he  had  a  splendid 
joke  to  spread  about  me.  Not  that  I  cared  at  the 
time ;  for  I  didn't  think  —  I  can't  help  saying  this, 
my  darling  —  I  didn't  think  that  you  — " 

He  was  getting  along  quite  well  in  his  own  con- 
ceit, and  happily  conscious  of  the  just  triumph  of 
innocence,  when  his  lover  looked  up  at  him  with 
a  glance  that  suddenly  cut  the  stream  of  his  speech 
and  exercised  a  depressing  effect  on  his  renascent 
courage.  Patrice's  eyes  were  undoubtedly  swollen 
and  vague ;  which  was  natural  enough,  for  she  had 
wept  through  the  great  part  of  a  sleepless  night, 
during  the  long  hours  of  which  Roddy  Chalmers' 
phrase  "  and  a  jolly  nice-looking  woman,  too " 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     189 

had  recurred  a  thousand  times  like  some  persistent 
leit-motif  in  the  discordant  symphony  of  her  medita- 
tions; but  there  was  a  dangerous  smoulder  in  her 
glance,  too,  as  she  replied : 

"  I  wonder  you  can  have  the  face  to  scold  me, 
Henry,"  she  said,  "  when  you  know  that  you're 
not  telling  me  the  truth." 

"  If  you  accuse  me  —  "  he  began,  hotly. 

"  You  know  you're  not,"  she  persisted.  "  You 
can't  have  forgotten  how  you  met  her.  Oh,  it's  no 
use  pretending  to  be  surprised!  I  had  a  talk  with 
Roddy  Chalmers  after  dinner  last  night.  He'd, 
put  me  to  shame  before  the  whole  table,  after  let- 
ting out  about  meeting  you,  by  laughing  in  that 
hideous,  idiotic  way  that  he  has,  and  saying  that  he 
was  awfully  sorry,  because  he'd  promised  not  to 
say  anything  about  it." 

D'Albiac  literally  bounded  on  the  window-seat 
with  fury  at  this  lying  suggestion. 

"  I  swear  I  never  —  he  never  —  !  Patrice,  how 
can  you  believe  —  ?  " 

"So  I  made  him  tell  me  everything;  I  said  he 
knew  that  I  was  the  last  person  to  be  jealous  and 
suspicious;  and  he  gave  me  the  whole  story.  Of 
course  he  saw  nothing  wrong  in  it  —  a  man 
wouldn't  —  and  he  said  you  found  this  — this  per- 
son fighting  in  the  street,  and  you  fought  too,  and 
helped  her  to  escape ;  and  you  and  he  and  she  have 
been  out  together;  and  you,  yourself,  have  been 


190     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

alone  for  hours  with  her,  without  even  Roddy  Chal- 
mers knowing  about  it,  over  and  over  again  lately. 
I  couldn't  think  what  was  the  matter  with  you  when 
you  were  down  here  last;  full  of  all  sorts  of  crazes 
that  you  'Id  only  have  laughed  at  in  your  right  mind. 
This  —  your  friend,  Roddy  says,  is  a  sort  of  anarch- 
ist and  has  all  these  horrible  ideas ;  and  you  'Id 
been  infected  with  them  after  only  a  day  or  two  of 
her  company.  What  can  I  think  ?  Anyone  in  their 
senses  must  see  it  at  once;  at  any  rate  I  do;  and 
I  know  now  why  you  were  so  touchy  and  unkind 
when  you  stayed  here,  and  why  you  haven't  written 
to  me  for  weeks.  You're  in  love  with  this  — 
creature." 

"  In  love  with  her  ?  "  Henry  repeated,  staring  on 
her  blankly.  "  Patrice,  you're  not  thinking  what 
you're  saying;  you're  laughing  at  me  —  or 
you're  — " 

The  girl's  restraint  on  her  grief  and  rage  sud- 
denly gave  way,  and  she  burst  into  a  flood  of  bitter 
tears,  through  which  she  spoke  with  hardly  dimin- 
ished vigour,  staunching  them  from  time  to  time 
with  a  lace  handkerchief  that  diffused  an  agreeable 
odour  of  night-scented  stock. 

"  You  are !  You  can't  deny  it !  Why  do  you 
give  up  all  your  engagements  and  hide -in  London, 
when  it's  quite  empty?  Why  are  you  always  go- 
ing to  see  her  ?  " 

"  To  have  my  portrait  painted,"  cried  Henry,  al- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     191 

most  himself  in  tears.  "  And  besides  I'm  not  in 
love  with  everybody  I  call  on.  You  don't  think 
that?" 

"  You  know  you  wouldn't  dream  of  calling  on 
her  if  you  weren't  —  a  dreadful,  low  woman!" 
Patrice  retorted  passionately. 

"  She's  nothing  of  the  kind,"  replied  Henry 
loudly,  as  angry  now  as  his  lover.  "  She's  just  as 
much  a  lady  as  —  as  anybody  is." 

"  She  isn't.  How  can  you  sit  there  and  say 
such  things?  Her  husband  was  a  common  engi- 
neer or  something;  and  she  lives  in  a  horrid 
slum." 

"  She's  as  well-behaved  as  anyone  I've  ever  met 
in  our  set,  and  —  and  a  hundred  times  cleverer," 
Henry  panted,  careless  of  results  in  his  sudden  rather 
inexplicably  violent  attack  of  wrath.  "  And  she's 
a  friend  of  mine,  and  a  very  nice  woman." 

"  You  see,"  sobbed  Patrice.  "  You  can't  bear  a 
word  against  her.  A  friend!  As  if  you  would 
make  friends  with  a  low-class  working  woman  who 
fights  in  the  streets  and  —  and  lives  on  —  on  hor- 
rible nuts  and  things.  Goodness  knows  what  she  is 
to  you!" 

The  innuendo  struck  D'Albiac  into  sudden  and 
amazed  silence.  Till  this  moment  he  had  regarded 
his  betrothed  as  innocently  unconscious  even  of  the 
existence  of  squalor  and  wickedness  in  the  world. 

"  Patrice ! "  he  said  in  a  low,  breathless  voice, 


192     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

lowering  his  intonation  a  seventh  on  the  second 
syllable.  "Patrice!" 

And  at  the  same  moment  came  a  step  in  the 
passage  and  the  door  opened,  as  Patrice  hurriedly 
turned,  holding  her  handkerchief  to  her  mouth, 
towards  the  window.  The  melancholy  figure  of 
Morrison  was  displayed  in  the  entrance,  announcing 
in  sepulchral  tones  that  Mrs.  Beaufoy  had  bidden 
him  say  that  lunch  awaited  Miss  Beaufoy  and  her 
lover.  D'Albiac  confronted  the  intruder  with 
proud  heroism,  despite  his  consciousness  of  a  single 
tear,  that  ran  in  a  ticklish  manner  down  the  side 
of  his  aristocratic  nose,  and  of  certain  inarticulate 
gasps  from  Patrice,  whose  emotions  forbade  her 
attempting  a  reply. 

"  Miss  Beaufoy  will  be  coming  directly,  Mor- 
rison," he  said,  with  a  dignity  not  entirely  in  con- 
sonance with  his  overwrought  appearance.  On  the 
features  of  the  imperturbable  functionary,  however, 
appeared  no  sign  of  any  recognition  of  the  storm 
that  was  in  progress;  he  regarded  D'Albiac's  tear- 
coursed  nose  and  the  heaving  back  of  his  young  mis- 
tress with  an  eye  that  was  dignified,  but  wholly 
unspeculative. 

"  Very  good,  Sir,"  was  all  his  reply,  in  the 
same  hollow,  charnel-house  voice. 

What  were  the  emotions  of  the  members  of  this 
unfriendly  race  of  employers  to  him?  None  the 
less  would  he  feed  to  repletion  thrice  daily,  and 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     193 

draw  his  handsome  monthly  honorarium;  for  the 
rest,  they  were  no  more  realities  to  him  than  he  to 
them. 

After  the  door  had  shut  behind  him  a  heavy  si- 
lence fell.  Perhaps  both  of  the  young  people  were 
a  little  ashamed  of  their  heated  recriminations;  yet 
there  remained  in  each  a  firm  conviction  that  it 
was  wholly  the  fault  of  the  other  that  such  inde- 
corum had  been  shown;  nor  did  either  feel  justi- 
fied in  stooping  to  make  overtures  of  peace.  Pa- 
trice had  been  childish,  unreasonably  jealous,  ready 
to  believe  any  calumny  of  one  whom  she  professed 
to  trust  and  love  more  than  all  the  world.  Henry 
had  been  loose,  perfidious,  deceitful,  altogether  vile; 
and  viler  because  still  so  handsome  and  strong  and 
dear,  and  because  his  voice  in  anger  was  so  thrill- 
ingly  dominant  and  masculine.  How  could  Henry 
be  the  first  to  renew  a  conversation  that  had  been 
broken  off  by  a  wicked  and  injurious  charge  against 
a  stainless  lady  who  was  numbered  amongst  his 
friends?  Or  how  could  a  maiden  press  home  this 
accusation  that  she  knew  to  be  true,  although  she 
hardly  understood  its  nature,  but  which  was  quite 
unsuitable  for  open  discussion  among  civilised  per- 
sons? The  position  threatened  to  become  an  im- 
passe; particularly  as  they  both  felt  the  danger  of 
their  smouldering  anger  bursting  forth  again  into 
regrettable  flame  at  the  first  renewal  of  argument. 
It  was  Patrice  who  decided,  after  some  minutes,  to 


194     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

end  the  matter  finally  and  calmly  in  a  few  words; 
confident  of  the  result,  and  humbly  proud  of  her 
own  forgiving  spirit.  She,  who  was  so  queenly, 
so  inaccessible  to  ordinary  mortals,  would  show 
how  she  could  pardon  the  man  to  whom  she  had 
given  her  heart ;  but  the  indulgence  must  necessarily 
be  accepted  with  proper  humility  and  gratitude. 

"  Henry,"  she  said,  returning  to  the  toneless 
monotony  of  her  first  carefully  rehearsed  remarks. 
"  It's  no  good  going  on  like  this.  It  must  be  her 
or  me." 

The  words  seemed  to  fall  on  her  own  ear  with  a 
gratefully  familiar  sound.  Some  play  or  book  that 
she  had  loved  had  surely  given  them  birth;  and 
she  was  proud  to  observe  that  they  had  a  stupefying 
effect  on  Henry. 

"Her  or  you?"  he  repeated,  with  wide-opened 
eyes.  "  What  do  you  mean  by  that?  " 

The  indelicacy  of  asking  for  an  explanation 
caused  her  to  drop  her  eyes  and  blush  a  little.  She 
had  hoped  and  believed  that  he  would  instantly 
make  his  choice,  with  suitable  abasement  of  spirit, 
and  that  the  subject  need  never  be  mentiond  again. 
Surely  he  was  unusually  dull  to-day? 

"  Don't  let's  talk  about  it  more  than  we  can 
help,"  she  protested,  with  a  look  of  faint  disgust. 
"  I  know  that  men  —  and  in  France  particularly  — . 
There  was  Monsieur  de  Dehan,  at  Nice.  When 
he  married — "  A  blush  and  a  faltering  voice 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     195 

hinted  only  too  plainly  at  the  nature  of  the  story 
concealed  by  this  maidenly  aposiopesis. 

"  But  —  but  by  what  right,"  Henry  burst  in, 
stammering  and  red,  "  do  you  compare  me  to 
Dehan?  Do  you  still  suggest  that  there's  any- 
thing—  anything  wrong  between  me  and  Mrs. 
Evans,  when  I  tell  you  — " 

"Henry,  Henry!"  cried  Patrice  plaintively,  un- 
consciously plagiarising  Gretchen.  "  How  can 
you  force  me  to  talk  of  such  dreadful  things? 
I  don't  want  to  know  or  hear  anything.  If  you 
love  me,  you  can't  hesitate,  surely.  Her  or  me." 

"  But  what  about  her  ?  "  the  distracted  French- 
man almost  screamed,  in  his  irritation  at  the  repeti- 
tion of  this  mystical  phrase. 

"  You  must  give  her  up,"  murmured  his  lover, 
with  her  breast  heaving  almost  as  obviously  and 
rapidly  as  that  of  a  gut  routiniert  Brunhilde,  when 
awakened  by  the  amorous  Volsung. 

"  Give  her  up  ?  But  I've  never  taken  her  down. 
I  don't  know  what  you  mean.  How  give  her  up?  " 

His  obstinate  and  over-acted  obtuseness  hurt  Miss 
Beaufoy's  pride  and  love  unbearably.  She  looked 
up  with  eyes  of  grief  and  anger,  and  her  voice  was 
tremulous. 

"If  you  really  love  me  you  wouldn't  ask  that," 
she  cried.  "  You'ld  promise,  without  another 
word,  that  you'ld  never  see  her  or  think  of  her 
again." 


196     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  But  that  would  be  to  admit  there  was  some- 
thing wrong,"  Henry  argued  with  a  face  and  voice 
of  fire.  "  I've  pledged  my  word  that  this  lady's 
only  a  casual  friend  of  mine.  Why  should  I  give 
her  up,  as  you  call  it?  Why  should  I  behave  as  if 
I'd  been  found  out  in  some  disgraceful  act?  Why 
should  I  insult  her  reputation  by  agreeing — " 

"  Because  I  ask  you,"  broke  in  the  girl,  stung 
once  more  to  rage,  "  and  because  you  once  said 
that  anything  I  asked,  reasonable  or  unreason*- 
able—  " 

"  So  long  as  it  only  affected  me,"  Henry  inter- 
rupted her.  "  There's  the  honour  of  a  lady  at 
stake  here  — " 

"A  lady!"  Patrice  interjected  scornfully. 

"  A  lady,"  he  repeated  firmly.  "  And  more 
than  that,  there's  all  your  trust  in  me  concerned. 
If  I'm  to  pretend  penitence,  for  no  reason,  and 
promise  to  cut  perfectly  respectable  people,  merely 
because  you  choose  to  believe  any  infamous,  stupid 
scandal  about  them  and  me — " 

"  You  dare  to  talk  like  that  ?  "  cried  Patrice,  the 
tears  again  springing  from  her  eyes.  "  You  don't 
love  me.  I  always  knew  you  didn't.  You  want  to 
get  rid  of  me." 

"That  you  know  isn't  true,"  D'Albiac  thun- 
dered. "  It's  because  I  love  you,  Patrice,  that  I'm 
ashamed  to  see  you  so  childish  and  ridiculous  and 
jealous  — " 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     197 

The  furious  words  died  on  his  lips  as  his  lover 
tore  from  her  left  hand  the  diamond  half-hoop  ring 
that  he  had  put  on  her  finger  one  happy  day,  cen- 
turies, it  seemed,  ago,  and  averting  her  face  held 
it  out  to  him  with  a  royal  gesture. 

"  Here's  the  ring  you  gave  me,"  she  said,  in 
passionate  undertone.  "  Take  it  away.  I  don't 
want  ever  to  see  you  again." 

"  But  — "  he  gasped,  with  a  sudden  sense  of 
the  futility  and  strangeness  of  this  unforeseen 
tragedy. 

"  Don't  speak,"  she  continued  in  the  same  hur- 
ried manner.  "  Go  away.  I  can't  bear  any  more. 
Here's  a  book  you  gave  me.  Take  it  too.  Here's 
another.  The  —  the  other  things  I'll  send  to  you 
—  and  your  —  your  letters." 

She  was  moving  hurriedly  about  the  room  as  she 
spoke,  picking  up  the  objects  she  mentioned  and 
thrusting  them  into  the  unwilling  hands  of  D'Al- 
biac;  and  her  words  were  punctuated  with  little 
gasps  and  sobs,  while  tears  poured  in  unrestrained 
streams  over  her  pretty  cheeks. 

"You  don't  mean  what  you  say?"  he  asked, 
gaping  in  a  foolish  manner  on  her,  and  yet  unable 
to  utter  a  word  of  dissuasion. 

"  Go  away,"  she  repeated.  "  Go  to  that  vile 
woman." 

A  moment  before,  he  had  had  thoughts  of  suing 
humbly  for  a  reconciliation  on  any  terms;  but  at 


198     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

the  repetition  of  this  charge  he  burst  into  new  re- 
bellion and  defiance. 

"  Very  well,"  he  said  bitterly.  "  You've  ruined 
my  life,  Patrice.  You're  cruel  and  unreasonable. 
But  I  won't  —  I  can't  humble  myself  like  that,  or 
behave  as  if  there  was  any  truth  in  these  abomin- 
able accusations.  If  you  wish  us  to  part,  we  must 
part.  It's  not  my  doing." 

Patrice  was  past  further  utterance, '  and  with  her 
handkerchief  pressed  to  her  eyes,  brushed  past  him, 
tore  open  the  door,  and  fled  to  her  bedroom;  leav- 
ing her  lover  grinding  his  teeth  in  the  middle  of  the 
boudoir,  with  a  large-paper  copy  of  an  illustrated 
and  be-ribboned  Omar,  a  diamond  ring  and  a  col- 
lection of  Ronsard's  poems,  bound  in  a  tooth-on- 
edge  fabric  of  dull  purple,  encumbering  his  hands. 
Suddenly  and  furiously  conscious  of  these  impedi- 
ments, he  thrust  them  all  three  violently  into  the 
cheerfully  blazing  fire,  spurned  a  hassock  from  his 
path  with  an  oath,  and  plunged  out  of  the  room, 
with  rumpled  hair  and  blazing  eyes.  On  the  wings 
of  rage  he  fled  from  the  house,  still  further  in- 
furiated to  find  that  in  his  absence  his  driver  had 
stabled  the  car  and  was  now  feasting  with  the 
servants  of  the  house.  In  trembling  tones,  and  with 
mental  vows  of  vengeance  against  this  unfaithful 
steward,  he  gave  orders  to  a  footman,  unwillingly 
drawn  from  his  midday  meal,  that  the  motor  was 
to  follow  him  to  the  village;  and  set  off  on  foot 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     199 

through  a  heavy  drizzle  along  the  long  avenue 
towards  the  lodge.  Throughout  the  walk  and  the 
subsequent  ill-served  meal  of  partially  cooked  cold 
beef  and  flat  beer  at  the  Beaufoy  Arms  he  nursed 
his  injured  pride  and  sense  of  injustice  with  an 
almost  loving  care;  and,  convinced  of  his  broken 
heart,  was  unable  to  conceal  from  himself  that  for 
the  present  his  two  dominant  emotions  were  rage 
and  an  odd  sense  of  having  triumphed  in  a 
righteous  cause.  The  first  of  these  was  vented  to 
some  extent  on  his  unhappy  chauffeur  during  the 
homeward  journey;  and  Henry  arrived  in  London 
in  a  thoughtful  and  almost  contented  condition 
which  he  did  not  then  seek  to  analyse,  glad  only 
to  find  that  he  supported  his  intense  grief  and  the 
destruction  of  his  future  life  with  so  much  heroism 
and  fortitude. 


VIII 

THE  rejected  lover's  broken  heart  confined  him  for 
a  little  while,  almost  continually,  to  his  house  in 
Cowley  Street  in  the  same  not  unpleasant  conscious- 
ness of  having  behaved  with  justice  and  dignity  in 
a  trying  situation.  As  the  realisation  of  the  full 
extent  of  his  loss  seemed,  like  many  overwhelming 
emotions,  to  be  a  little  slow  in  its  development,  con- 
fining itself,  at  present,  largely  to  a  regretful  con- 
templation in  retrospect  of  Miss  Beaufoy's  physical 
beauty,  he  determined,  before  very  long,  to  antici- 
pate its  arrival  by  permitting  himself  to  seek  those 
consolations  proper  to  such  occasions.  He  was 
aware  that  the  correct  course  for  one  in  his  dismal 
case  was  to  plunge  into  dissipation,  the  wilder  the 
better;  and  the  correctness  of  his  life  during  the 
last  few  months,  while  engaged  in  his  chaste  rap- 
tures with  Patrice,  had  the  effect  of  making  this 
lurid  prospect  so  little  repugnant  to  him  that  he 
found  himself  obliged  to  check  his  fancies  with  the 
reminder  that  the  step  he  proposed  to  take  must 
be  regarded  only  as  an  anodyne  and  not  as  a  stimu- 
lant. It  is  true  that  his  earliest  idea  of  soothing 
his  torments,  on  his  return  to  London,  had  been 
the  absurd  one  of  seeking  out  Flora  Evans  and 
confiding  his  sorrows  to  her;  but  the  painter  and 

200 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     201 

dissoluteness  were  such  widely  dissociated  concep- 
tions that  he  quickly  realised  his  foolishness.  Be- 
sides, she  had  been  the  unconscious  and  innocent 
cause  of  the  whole  tragedy;  if  he  sought  consola- 
tion with  her  it  might  truly  seem  to  worldlings  that 
Patrice  had  been  partly  justified  in  her  ridiculous 
jealousy.  By-and-by  (if  his  wild  escapades  did  not 
first  destroy  him  or  cast  him  into  the  depths)  he 
might  hope  to  hold  Flora  Evans'  hand  again  in 
calm  and  affectionate  friendship.  Meanwhile,  it 
behoved  him  to  put  the  thought  of  her  aside  and 
robe  himself  in  scarlet  for  the  dance  of  death.  To 
this  end,  he  sent  the  artist  a  cheque  for  the  unfin- 
ished picture,  explaining  in  suitably  cryptic  terms 
that  events  had  made  its  completion  unnecessary; 
but  that  he  hoped,  in  brighter  days,  to  renew  his 
friendship  with  her;  and  then  precipitated  himself 
into  the  whirlpool. 

The  Maelstrom  chosen  was  the  Continental 
Restaurant,  which  struck  him  at  the  time  as  per- 
haps rather  a  mildly  commercial  gateway  to  the 
Inferno.  But  his  limited  knowledge  of  the  lower 
regions  of  London  set  itself  in  the  way  of  a  truly 
worthy  beginning.  In  Paris  he  could  have  shown 
to  better  advantage;  meanwhile,  he  looked  upon 
this  dull  and  commonplace  restaurant,  with  its 
rows  of  dejected  damsels  sitting  in  solitary  expec- 
tation at  the  small  round  tables,  as  but  a  step 
towards  the  excesses  of  Elagabalus,  Tiberius  and 


202     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

Commodus.  Without  any  enthusiasm,  he  selected 
for  his  first  partner  in  the  mad  dance  a  slim,  dark 
young  woman  in  a  blue  silk  evening  dress,  past 
its  first  freshness,  who  had  a  suggestion  in  her  ap- 
pearance of  Patrice,  as  she  might  appear  after  ris- 
ing from  a  bed  of  sickness  or  at  the  completion  of 
a  long  journey  on  the  Sleeping  Cars.  Miss  Kitty 
Wilson  was  not  so  tall  or  plump  as  Miss  Beaufoy, 
nor  did  she,  of  course,  approach  her  in  beauty ;  and, 
instead  of  the  scornful  pride  of  the  lovely  young 
patrician,  she  displayed  an  apologetic  and  anxious 
manner  in  her  relations  with  Henry  that  had  the 
effect  of  saddening  him  more  than  a  little.  Her 
conversation  was  largely  of  indigestion  (to  which, 
it  seemed,  she  was  a  martyr),  and,  in  rare  moments 
of  expansion,  of  a  certain  mythical  Cambridge  un- 
dergraduate, whom  she  accused  of  being  the  first 
cause  of  her  becoming  "  gay."  The  highly  regret- 
ful manner  in  which  she  referred  to  this  "  gaiety  " 
did  not  strike  Henry  as  suitable  to  the  orgies  of 
wickedness  in  which  it  was  his  aim  to  wallow;  but 
she  was  such  a  kind-hearted  and  rigidly  respectable 
girl,  apart  from  her  Cytherean  avocations,  in  which 
she  plainly  took  no  more  than  a  conscientious  and 
economic  interest,  that  he  had  not  the  heart  to  re- 
linquish her  in  favour  of  a  more  Messalinan  com- 
panion; the  more  that  she  speedily  developed  a 
deeply  respectful  devotion  to  him,  chiefly  the  re- 
sult of  a  gratitude  for  his  oddly  polite  treatment 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     203 

of  herself.  Moreover,  he  had  a  suspicion  that  he 
might  be  equally  unlucky  in  his  next  venture;  and 
was  unable  in  any  case  to  summon  the  necessary 
energy  for  any  protracted  quest  of  the  infamous. 
Under  the  influence  of  Miss  Wilson's  gentle  de- 
pression of  demeanour  and  regrets  for  the  innocent 
and  irrevocable  past,  Henry,  no  lover  by  nature 
of  depravity,  speedily  discovered  the  objections  to 
his  rakish  scheme ;  and  as  soon  as  he  was  no  longer 
intent  on  his  own  ruin,  the  society  of  this  indiffer- 
ently educated  and  dyspeptic  lady  filled  him  with 
infinite  gloom  and  distaste.  Drunkenness  was  not, 
of  course,  to  be  thought  of ;  it  was  so  extremely  in- 
elegant and  unpleasant;  there  was  gambling,  to  be 
sure,  but  he  seemed  to  lack  the  true  gambler's 
spirit,  and  conscientiously  lost  a  good  deal  of  money 
with  neither  regret,  pleasure,  nor  excitement.  It 
was  plain  that  he  was  not  marked  out  to  be  a  Don 
Juan;  and  he  became  regretfully  cognisant  of  the 
existence  of  a  churchwarden's  soul  beneath  the  dis- 
guise of  a  dangerously  dashing  physical  presence. 
Obviously,  however,  even  the  mild  and  provincial 
dissipation  through  which  he  had  passed  had  had 
the  desired  effect;  for  he  looked  back  on  the  days 
of  his  engagement  without  a  regret  or  a  heart- 
throb. The  magic  web  thrown  over  him  by  his 
beautiful  mistress  had  been  rent,  by  her  own  act 
and  the  struggles  of  his  pride,  into  a  thousand 
fragments;  and  the  flames  of  his  subsequent  tepid 


204     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

ardours  had  consumed  the  shreds,  so  that  nothing 
but  a  few  sentimental  ashes  remained. 

Patrice  meanwhile  had  confidently  awaited  the 
return  of  her  penitent  lover,  and,  amazed  at  his 
silence,  had,  at  last,  written  a  short  letter  to  him, 
offering  him  full  pardon,  if  he  would  but  give  her 
the  promise  that  she  had  sought  from  him  at  their 
interview.  Henry  was,  of  course,  unconscious  of 
the  bitter  tears,  agonies  of  humbled  pride,  in  death- 
grips  with  passionate  longing  for  her  lost  lover, 
and  many  sleepless  nights  that  this  little,  pathetically 
haughty  and  misspelt  note  had  cost  the  spoilt  prin- 
cess. He  was  therefore  able  to  regard  it  with 
some  reason  as  merely  a  renewal  of  her  former  un- 
just accusations,  and  to  reply  to  it  with  a  cool, 
judicial  intimation  that  he  was  willing  and  anxious 
for  a  reconciliation,  but  could  never  consent  to  sue 
for  pardon  for  imaginary  sins  to  one  who  had  no 
trust  in  him,  and  made  an  act  of  falsity  the  con- 
dition of  their  union.  Miss  Beaufoy  had  received 
this  chilly  correction  with  a  burst  of  passionate 
and  almost  incredulous  resentment  that  made  things 
very  unpleasant  for  her  family  and  dependents  for 
some  days;  and  had  written  back,  in  her  haste,  a 
few  fiery  lines  to  Henry  which,  in  his  uncompro- 
mising frame  of  mind,  were  sufficient  to  make  the 
rupture  absolutely  and  permanently  irremediable. 
It  was  after  reading  this  note  and  indignantly 
burning  the  pieces,  so  that  the  wicked  suggestions 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     205 

against  the  character  of  a  kind  and  pure-minded 
lady  might  not  fall  into  other  hands,  that  he  realised 
the  completion  of  his  cure,  and  the  consequent  re- 
lease from  the  necessity  of  pursuing  his  late  miry 
and  unpleasant  paths  in  life.  He  was,  he  told  him- 
self, a  soured,  disappointed  man;  embittered  by 
experience  and  the  discovery  of  woman's  perversity ; 
a  twentieth  century  Childe  Harold;  and  it  was  odd 
how  agreeable  the  knowledge  of  this  new  cyni- 
cism was  to  him,  and  with  what  anticipatory  enjoy- 
ment he  excused  his  desertion  of  Miss  Wilson,  who 
received  his  present  of  money  and  patent  mendaci- 
ties with  a  philosophical  melancholy  that  showed 
she  was  no  longer  sensitive  to  the  whips  and  scorns 
of  time. 

"  I  am  sorry,  dear,"  was  all  she  said,  in  a  low- 
spirited  manner.  "  You'll  come  and  see  me  again, 
if  you  ever  do  come  back  to  England,  won't  you?  " 

The  endearing  appellation  was  merely  introduced 
professionally,  out  of  habit;  and,  to  Henry's  ears, 
the  respectful  tone,  in  which  it  was  always  em- 
ployed towards  him,  made  it  only  a  synonym  for 
"  sir."  He  assured  her  earnestly  that  it  should  be 
his  first  pleasure  and  duty,  on  return  from  this  un- 
specified exile,  to  acquaint  himself  with  her  circum- 
stances ;  and,  perceiving  the  Stoic  incredulity  in  her 
sad  eyes,  shook  her  warmly  by  the  hand,  and  es- 
caped from  her  presence,  before  she  had  time  duti- 
fully to  offer  him  the  customary  indeclinable  kiss. 


206     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

A  deep  depression  of  mind,  as  of  the  philanthro- 
pist leaving  the  incurable  ward  or  the  abode  of 
hopeless  poverty,  accompanied  him  in  his  flight,  in 
place  of  the  sense  of  shuddering  yet  delicious  shame 
or  defiant  wantonness  suitable  to  one  parting  from 
dainty  vice;  but  the  relief  of  escaping  from  this 
yawning  and  bourgeois  association  was  so  great 
that  he  was  soon  able  to  throw  off  his  memories 
with  a  little  shake  of  his  broad  shoulders,  and  antici- 
pate, with  his  usual  optimistic  delight  in  living,  the 
pleasures  that  the  future  held  for  him.  Among 
these  there  were  some  that  had  been  necessarily 
closed  to  him  since  his  engagement  —  innocent  flir- 
tations and  sentimental  friendships  with  maidens 
and  young  married  women,  his  favorite  com- 
panions of  all  the  human  race.  Without  outrag- 
ing his  opinion  of  his  own  fidelity,  he  could  now 
contemplate  the  regaining  of  his  freedom  with 
positive  satisfaction.  He  had  loved,  and  been  cast 
away;  the  fault  was  not  his;  and  it  was  moreover 
plain,  from  the  behaviour  of  his  betrothed  in  the 
matter,  that  they  had  never  been  really  destined 
thoroughly  to  understand  and  freely  to  trust  in 
each  other.  Memories  of  the  limited  nature  of 
their  intercourse,  of  the  probably  unjustifiable  con- 
struction that  he  had  put,  in  the  fondness  of  his 
heart,  on  Patrice's  constant  reticence  and  mystic 
aloofness  from  his  enthusiasms,  supported  this  be- 
lief. How  much  better  to  have  found  this  out  in 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     207 

time,  instead  of  embracing  the  destiny  of  a  young 
man  married  to  one  whom  he  could  not  hope  to 
make  happy!  How  bitter  to  have  lost  the  licit 
pleasures  of  gay  and  popular  youth  for  a  mutual 
bondage  shortly  to  become  abhorred  of  both ! 

"  Young  married  women,"  suggested  Mrs. 
Evans,  naturally  enough ;  and  as  he  sauntered  along 
the  Fulham  Road  from  Stamford  Bridge,  near 
which  Kitty  Wilson  had  her  flat,  it  occurred  to 
him  that  he  was  within  a  few  minutes'  walk  of 
the  studio.  The  idea  of  the  slender,  alert  presence 
of  the  painter  and  of  the  tumbling,  glittering  brook 
of  her  speech  set  him  smiling,  and  acted  on  his 
mind  and  body  as  a  positive  tonic  after  the  lym- 
phatic sentimentality  and  anxiously  polite  sadness 
of  his  late  "  gay  "  companion.  Marriage  —  nay, 
the  whole  sex  obsession  —  seemed  to  him  at  this 
moment  morbid,  unwholesome  and  cloying.  Here 
was  almost  an  ideal  friend ;  one  with  whom  he  felt 
he  would  be  glad  daily  to  pass  hours  in  open-hearted 
comradeship.  She  happened  to  be  a  woman,  it  is 
true;  but  had  she  been  a  man  (if  one  could  imagine 
such  a  very  flower-like  little  person  as  a  coarse,  un- 
decorative  man!)  it  would  have  been  of  course  ex- 
actly the  same.  For  here,  at  least,  there  could  be 
no  question  of  love,  still  less  of  marriage;  the 
mere  idea  was  ridiculous;  and  the  realisation  of 
the  absurdity  added  greatly  to  Henry's  apprecia- 
tion of  the  disinterestedness  of  their  queer  friend- 


208     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

ship.  Yes,  he  would  go  and  see  Flora;  he  was 
just  in  the  mood  for  her  mischievous  impertinences 
and  millennial  enthusiasms. 

Mrs.  Evans  was  at  work  as  usual  on  a  design; 
but  she  put  it  aside  at  once  and  shook  hands  with 
flattering  warmth;  contemplating  his  face  at  the 
same  time  with  an  expression  of  obvious  com- 
miseration, quite  unlike  her  habitual  boyish  anima- 
tion or  occasional  impishness. 

"  Mr.  D'Albiac !  I  am  glad !  I  was  rather 
afraid  I'd  seen  the  last  of  you,"  she  said,  blushing 
brightly  and  transitorily  at  the  surprise  of  the  visit. 

"Why?"  asked  Henry,  smiling,  with  genuine 
pleasure,  down  at  her  vivid  face.  "  I  told  you  I'd 
look  you  up  again  before  long,  didn't  I?  " 

"  You  didn't  say  before  long.  Oh !  By-the-by, 
thank  you  very  much  for  the  cheque.  I  owe  you 
some  of  the  money  back  again,  though,  because  it 
was  meant  to  include  a  frame;  and  besides  the 
picture  wasn't  really  finished." 

"  Well,  finish  it  now,"  Henry  suggested.  "  I 
want  to  have  a  good,  long  talk  with  you,  if  you're 
not  too  busy;  and  if  you're  painting  you  won't  get 
sick  of  me  so  soon.  Besides  I've  changed  my  mind. 
I  should  like  to  have  the  picture  after  all." 

"  Would  you  ?  "  she  asked,  with  her  head  on  one 
side,  studying  his  eyes  intently.  "  That's  nice. 
I'll  get  it  out,  then." 

Within  a  few  moments  Flora  was  painting  and 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     209 

Henry  talking  and  laughing,  as  if  the  past  few 
weeks,  with  their  dismal  catastrophe  and  consequent 
excesses,  had  never  intervened. 

"  Is  it  all  right  again,  then?"  Flora  asked,  pres- 
ently, and  Henry,  in  spite  of  the  suddenness  of  this 
question,  coming  on  top  of  several  minutes  of  in- 
different conversation,  was  well  aware  of  her  mean- 
ing. 

"All  right?  Oh,  yes,  thanks.  It's  all  right} 
now." 

"  I'm  so  glad.  Of  course,  I  knew  at  once  what 
must  have  happened.  So  you've  made  it  up,  like 
sensible  children  ?  " 

"  No,"  said  Henry,  briefly,  assuming  a  masculine 
sternness  of  demeanour. 

Flora  looked  up  in  quick  surprise  at  the  word; 
and,  after  her  eyes  had  rested  for  a  minute  at  least 
on  his  haughty  face,  turned  them  back  again,  with 
the  faintest  flutter  at  the  corners  of  her  mouth, 
towards  her  canvas. 

"  Oh?  "  she  said,  with  unobtrusive  interrogation. 
If  he  was  inclined  to  be  confidential,  the  monosyl- 
lable seemed  to  say,  well  and  good;  and  if  not,  let 
him  suggest  a  new  subject  of  conversation.  In 
Henry,  however,  an  overmastering  desire  for  sym- 
pathy and  confession  had  sprung  up. 

"  No,"  he  repeated,  gravely.  "  My  engagement 
is  broken  off.  I  wonder  you  didn't  see  it  in  The 
Morning  Post." 


210     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  I  take  in  the  News,  pending  the  publication  of 
anything  better,"  she  explained,  apologetically. 

"  It  only  appeared  yesterday,"  said  Henry, 
briefly,  with  a  Roman  calm;  and  a  heavy  silence 
succeeded,  during  which  Flora  seemed  to  ru- 
minate. 

"  Much  cut  up  about  it  ?"  she  suggested  suddenly, 
with  enquiring  eyebrows  and  parted  lips. 

It  seemed  incumbent  on  Henry,  at  this  point, 
to  press  his  finger  nails  into  his  palms  and  reply 
to  the  question,  at  first,  in  low  broken  accents, 
with  eyes  averted  from  his  interrogator.  Thus 
therefore  he  answered,  not  without  a  slight  sensa- 
tion of  artificiality;  but  it  was  necessary  to  convey 
to  her  something  of  the  unbearable  agonies  that 
he  might  have  endured,  had  he  not  taken  the  drowsy 
drugs  of  dissipation  in  time. 

"  At  first  —  yes,"  he  muttered,  searching  the 
floor  with  a  haggard  gaze.  "  But  I  faced  it.  And 
now  —  now,"  he  continued,  in  a  brighter,  braver 
tone,  lifting  his  eyes  to  the  watchful  face  before 
him,  "  I  feel  that  it  was  for  the  best,  perhaps.  We 
didn't  understand  eath  other;  we  never  had.  Bet- 
ter to  know  in  time.  So  we  agreed  to  part.  There 
was  an  ugly  wrench  of  course;  but  the  pain's  over 
now;  nothing  left  but  a  dull  aching." 

A  sigh  finished  the  speech;  and  he  had  a  warm 
sense  of  enjoyment  of  his  own  manly  English 
words;  an  enjoyment  which  seemed  to  find  a  re- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     211 

sponse  in  Flora's  bright  eyes  and  the  faint  ripple 
that  played  so  constantly  over  the  calm,  .cool  sur- 
face of  her  attentive  face.  She  allowed  a  decent 
interval  for  reflective  regret  and  the  mastery  of 
emotional  weakness ;  much  as  the  priest  pauses,  gen- 
erally rather  inadequately,  after  the  words  "  all 
sick  persons"  in  the  Litany;  and  then  added  a 
phrase  of  consolation. 

"  I  think  you  were  both  unusually  brave  and 
wise.  And,  if  you  won't  think  me  rude,  I  believe 
that  a  descendant  of  the  Conqueror  wouldn't  have 
been  quite  the  sort  of  wife  that'ld  have  suited  you 
best,  perhaps." 

Henry  started  and  frowned. 

"  You  mean  I'm  a  snob  ? "  he  enquired,  in  an 
offended  tone. 

"  Everybody's  some  sort  of  snob,  I  s'pose,"  Flora 
said,  soothingly.  "  And  I  shouldn't  dream  of  us- 
ing such  a  horrid  word  about  you  in  particular. 
But  the  Conqueror  side  of  your  character  —  shall 
we  say?  —  has  been  sufficiently  developed.  I 
think  there  are  other  influences  that'ld  be  likely  to 
be  more  useful  to  you.  Avito  vires  honore  a  little, 
I  think,  don't  you?  And  I  hope  I'm  not  tutoyant 
you,  Mr.  D'Albiac;  because  I've  forgotten  most  of 
my  Latin.  But  you  know  you're  capable  of  doing 
something  on  your  own  account,  and  it  takes  so 
little  encouragement  to  make  one  content  to  be  an 
idler." 


212     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  I  mean  to  do  something,  you  know  that," 
Henry  protested.  "  We've  talked  that  over  often, 
before." 

"  But  one  may  go  on  meaning,  until  it's  too  late. 
Something's  always  wanted  —  generally  it's 
hunger  —  to  give  one  the  push  off.  Well,  now 
you've  got  it.  Here's  something  to  be  forgotten; 
you're  depressed  and  disillusioned  and  discon- 
tented. Get  some  good,  hard  work,  and  you'll  be 
cured  in  no  time." 

The  principal  feeling  in  Henry's  mind  at  the 
precise  moment  being  one  of  placid  and  entire  con- 
tentment with  his  situation,  he  was  inclined  to  seek 
out  some  specious  reason  for  delay.  But  he  re- 
membered he  had  spoken  of  a  dull  aching  at  his 
heart;  and  he  was  naturally  averse  from  recanting 
the  statement  and  substituting  a  confession  of  com- 
plete recovery. 

"  No  doubt  you've  just  been  hanging  about  dis- 
consolately all  these  weeks,  bothering  yourself  day 
and  night  about  your  disappointment,"  Flora  con- 
tinued, and  Henry,  unable  even  to  refer  to  the  es- 
sentially masculine  medicine  he  had  exhibited, 
nodded  silently.  "  Haven't  you  often  wished  you'd 
some  occupation  that  forced  your  mind  off  the  sub- 
ject? One  can't  pine  while  one's  ri vetting,  for  in- 
stance, or  writing  a  book,  or  doing  an  operation, 
or  digging  in  a  coal  mine." 

"  Oh,"   he   replied,   lightly.     "  One  need  never 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     213 

be  at  a  loss  for  something  to  do,  as  long  as  one's 
pretty  well  off." 

"  But  that's  such  a  futile  prospect  to  look  for- 
ward to,"  Flora  insisted.  "  Constantly  planning 
how  to  spend  your  money,  just  so  as  to  avoid  bore- 
dom. Besides  it  always  catches  you  in  the  end; 
you  know  it  does.  And  a  young  man,  and  a  clever 
man,  to  be  content  with  that!  Haven't  you  any 
ambition  ?  " 

"  Not  a  scrap,"  said  Henry,  with  cool  shameless- 
ness.  "  Not  a  scrap,  I'm  afraid." 

The  painter,  however,  appeared  to  be  entirely 
unimpressed  by  this  confession. 

"  What  nonsense !  "  she  cried,  laughing  with  an 
impudent  enjoyment  that  brought  the  colour  to  the 
cheeks  of  the  cynic.  "  You,  of  all  people !  Why, 
you  know  you'd  simply  revel  in  success  or  fame. 
And  please  don't  try  to  look  like  Gallio;  at  least 
not  for  my  benefit;  because  British  phlegm,  and 
Parisian  blague,  and  aristocratic  or  artistic  or  intel- 
lectual snobbery  —  Oh !  all  sorts  of  egoism  and 
aloofness  and  apathy  —  are  perfectly  odious  to  me. 
It's  just  because  I  know  they're  quite  unnatural  to 
you,  Mr.  D'Albiac,  that  I  like  you.  Be  yourself 
—  that's  all  that's  wanted.  Why,  think  of  all  the 
advantages  you've  got  over  most  people,  to  launch 
you  —  education,  proper  physical  development, 
good  manners,  self-confidence,  no  worry  about 
means.  It'd  be  nothing  less  than  a  disgrace,  if  you 


214     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

settled  down  into  a  dull  country  squire  or  a  stupid, 
noxious  man-about-town.  Do  something!  Oh, 
if  I'd  had  your  sex  advantages  and  your  brains  and 
your  opportunities!  I  might  have  been  some  use 
in  the  world  then;  I've  got  the  wish  to  be,  at  least. 
And  surely  you're  not  going  to  shirk  ?  " 

There  was  a  ring  in  her  voice  and  an  inspiration 
in  her  flung  hands,  cheeks  aflame  and  crepitant  eyes 
that  strangely  stirred  her  auditor. 

"  Not  if  you'll  be  my  friend ! "  he  cried,  with 
quite  boyish  ardour  and  responsiveness. 

"  Why,  of  course  I  am,"  Flora  said,  with  a  sud- 
den, swift  drop  into  tranquil  good-humour.  "  Not 
that  I'm  much  good  to  you,  I'm  afraid,  except  to 
stir  you  up  with  a  long  pole  when  you're  inclined 
to  be  lazy.  However,  that's  a  very  necessary  duty, 
too." 

Enthusiasm  was  so  strange  to  D'Albiac,  after 
his  long  association  with  the  politely  unmoved 
people  of  the  well-bred  world,  that  its  very  novelty 
inspired  and  delighted  him;  and  gave  him  a  brief 
and  welcome  holiday  from  his  bravely  sustained 
struggle  with  his  naturally  excitable  and  fiery  dis- 
position. A  few  sermonising  words  from  this 
young  woman  seemed  to  have  sent  through  him  a 
thrill  which  none  of  his  recent  experiments  in  lib- 
ertinism had  succeeded  in  inducing.  In  the  interest 
of  this  already  disastrous  and  undoubtedly  peculiar 
friendship,  it  almost  seemed  to  him,  for  the  time, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     215 

that  he  had  been  wasting  his  life  in  seeking  the 
ordinary  pursuits  of  a  gentleman,  and  that  perhaps 
these  eccentrics  had  after  all  discovered  a  better 
secret  of  happiness.  At  least  it  was  one  that  was 
at  the  disposition  of  everyone,  to  a  greater  or  less 
degree;  whereas  he  was  well  aware  of  the  con- 
stant and  ungrateful  struggle  that  many  of  his  own 
set  had  to  support,  in  order  to  keep  their  place  in 
society.  With  the  usual  hot-headedness  of  his 
chameleonic  nature,  he  was  convinced  that  he  had 
no  friend  so  valuable  to  him  as  this  fantastic 
young  woman ;  and  an  idea  that  had  long  stirred  at 
the  back  of  his  mind  now  boldly  broke  its  way 
out  of  its  prison. 

"  Roddy  Chalmers  and  —  well,  most  of  your 
friends  —  Mr.  Sutton,  for  instance  —  call  you 
Flora.  Would  you  mind  —  may  I  too  ?  " 

"  Of  course,  if  you  like,"  Flora  answered,  tran- 
quilly unaware,  it  seemed,  of  his  schoolboy  abrupt- 
ness and  the  stammer  that  overtook  him  before  he 
finished  his  speech.  Mercifully,  too,  she  forbore 
to  look  round  at  him,  as  she  gave  him  the  permis- 
sion; for  he  was  furiously  aware  that  his  face  had 
become  crimson  and  damp  with  quite  unaccount- 
able embarrassment  and  a  delight  which  seemed 
out  of  all  proportion  to  the  favour  granted. 

"  I  think  it's  so  difficult  to  talk  when  one  is  on 
terms  of  —  when  one  has  to  call  — "  he  began  in 
lame  explanation. 


216     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  Oh,  I  quite  agree.  I  never  feel  I  know  any- 
body, really,  until  I  get  to  the  Christian-name  stage 
with  them.  As  a  rule,  it  doesn't  take  long  with 
the  people  I  meet  I  forget  what  your  name  is? 
Not  Jules?" 

"  No,  no,  that's  only  Roddy's  nonsense. 
Henry,"  he  said,  with  a  smiling  gasp  that  he  knew 
to  be  fatuous. 

"  Henry,"  she  repeated.  "  Well,  Henry,  if  you 
and  I  are  going  to  be  friends,  you've  got  to  '  dig 
out,'  as  Roddy  himself  would  say.  I  haven't  been 
used  to  the  leisured  classes,  and  I'm  afraid  we 
shouldn't  agree  long  if  it's  your  only  ambition  to 
belong  to  them." 

"  I  put  myself  in  your  hands,"  said  Henry,  with 
humorous  submission.  "  But  I  wish  I'd  half  your 
energy,  Flora." 

"  Oh,  me !  "  said  Flora,  ungrammatically,  with  a 
little  shrug.  "  I  haven't  ever  had  the  chance  to 
idle,  since  the  day  that  Father  sent  me  to  the  High 
School.  It's  no  merit  of  mine;  it's  necessity." 

And  brushing  aside  any  further  personal  refer- 
ence to  herself,  she  plunged  into  one  of  her  vigorous 
discussions  of  social  questions,  in  which  Henry  fol- 
lowed her  with  something  more  than  his  custom- 
ary interest,  and  scarcely  a  touch  of  that  peevish 
recalcitrance  that  he  so  often  manifested  in  argu- 
ment with  her.  It  seemed  to  him  to-day  that  the 
personal  duties  which  she  strove  to  heap  upon  him 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     217 

appeared  far  more  reasonably  possible  than  they 
had,  during  his  engagement  To  the  future  hus- 
band of  Patrice,  with  his  aristocratic  obligations 
and  inevitable  association,  for  the  most  part,  with 
the  rich  and  noble  members  of  the  population  alone, 
such  schemes  for  his  future  as  Flora  persistently 
advanced  were  patently  unworthy  and  impossible. 
But,  for  the  time  being,  he  seemed  to  have  severed 
his  ties  with  his  own  class  and  the  people  among 
whom  by  right  of  birth  he  should  move.  Here, 
in  an  empty  town,  his  only  companion  a  working 
artist  of  the  lower  middle  class,  he  was  no  longer 
so  acutely  and  constantly  sensible  of  his  title,  his 
position  in  society  and  his  wealth.  He  could  al- 
most believe,  almost  enjoy  believing,  that  Flora 
was  his  social  equal,  that  they  were  two  unknown 
members  of  the  indistinguishable  herd;  with  noth- 
ing to  entitle  them  to  admiration  beyond  the  pos- 
sible results  of  their  own  exertions  —  a  mean  and 
begrudged  substitute  for  the  generous  homage  uni- 
versally yielded  to  costly  clothes  and  ornaments, 
whether  paid  for  or  otherwise,  vast  and  swift 
motor  cars,  spacious  houses  and  estates  and,  per- 
haps most  admired  and  least  troublesome  of  all, 
the  right  to  use  sonorous  and  insolent  prefixes  to 
one's  name  in  the  place  of  such  cacophonous  styles 
as  Mister,  Missis  or  Miss.  D'Albiac  had  already 
known  Flora's  fanaticisms  to  be  infectious;  and  in 
her  company  he  found  himself  docilely  agreeing 


218     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

with  her  that  it  was  really  a  matter  of  urgent  im- 
portance so  to  recast  our  social  system  as  to  make 
the  existence  of  degraded  and  hopeless  poverty,  no 
doubt  permitted  on  earth  for  excellent  reasons,  as 
often  explained  by  the  pious,  a  national  disgrace 
and  an  impossibility,  even  at  the  expense  of  shear- 
ing the  well-to-do  of  much  of  the  beauty  and  colour 
of  their  life.  He  swallowed,  with  only  the  faint- 
est of  gulps  and  wry  faces,  such  propositions  as 
that  women  were  merely  a  servile  class  so  long  as 
political  freedom  was  denied  them,  and  that  to 
be  told  that  you  were  lucky  to  be  looked  after  and 
have  things  done  for  you  "  much  better  than  you 
could  do  them  yourself  "  was  an  insult  to  the  in- 
telligence of  mature  human  beings  and  a  feebly  un- 
convincing excuse  for  tyranny;  that  monarchy  was 
a  ridiculous  and  costly  survival  of  the  world's  in- 
fancy, and  that  in  the  face  of  the  unscrupulously 
sentimental  and  snobbish  use  made  by  political 
parties  of  the  sacrosanct  and  occult  personality  of 
the  monarch,  and  of  the  pestilent  example  of  serv- 
ility and  jobbery  set  throughout  society  by  the  in- 
fluence of  Courts,  it  was  utterly  untrue  to  main- 
tain that  the  system  was,  at  least,  entirely  harmless, 
and  valuable  as  a  prophylactic  against  Presiden- 
tial fever;  that  an  established  Church,  with  its 
enormous  archiepiscopal  stipends,  its  "palaces," 
its  gifts  of  livings,  its  sweating  of  many  of  the 
working  clergy,  and  its  attachment  to  the  moneyed 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     219 

classes,  was  about  as  unchristian  an  institution  as 
could  have  been  devised,  and  one  that  would  have 
aroused  the  most  righteously  indignant  invective 
from  the  communistic,  self-denying  founder  of  the 
religion  it  professed  to  administer;  besides  being 
an  unjust  imposition  in  a  country  where  the  ma- 
jority of  the  population  were  either  directly  opposed 
to  or  entirely  uninterested  in  the  establishment; 
that  the  monopoly  of  land,  the  inheritance  of 
wealth,  and  the  exploitation  of  labour  by  a  com- 
paratively small  class  of  men  with  the  special,  by 
no  means  valuable  and  generally  quite  unintellec- 
tual  faculty  of  acquiring  and  accumulating  capital, 
were  diseases  that  would  have  to  be  treated  with 
the  knife  before  the  body  politic  could  hope  for 
health;  that  the  modern  system  of  education,  with 
its  hypocritical  concealment  or  denial  of  the  com- 
monest and  most  honourable  truths  of  nature,  is 
productive  of  absolutely  .incalculable  harm  and 
wickedness;  that  patriotism,  in  its  general  signifi- 
cation of  the  glorification  and  aggrandisement  of 
one's  own  particular  geographical  or  linguistic  area 
at  the  expense  of  the  rest  of  the  world,  was  an 
outworn  ideal,  once  perhaps  useful,  but  now  ripe 
to  be  cast,  with  all  its  Mumbo-jumbo  symbolism 
and  flag-worship,  on  the  scrap  heap;  that  the 
apathetic  toleration  of  theological  creeds  and  dis- 
credited social  conventions  by  those  who  neither 
cared  for  nor  believed  in  them,  on  the  ground  that 


220     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

they  "  were  good  for  women  and  the  poor,"  or  that 
if  they  were  destroyed  something  worse  might  take 
their  place,  was  either  cowardly  or  intentionally 
immoral;  for  that  truth  and  frankness  were  the 
two  fundamental  safeguards  of  society;  that  most 
of  our  penal  system  was  revengeful,  barbarous,  and 
not  only  entirely  useless,  but  most  effective  in  pro- 
ducing and  maintaining  a  rebel  class;  that  a  car- 
nivorous diet  was  only  worthy  of  wild  beasts,  and 
that  it  took  a  dire  revenge  on  its  adherents  in  the 
form  of  preventable  disease  —  in  short,  that  a 
world  which  generally  supposed  itself  far  advanced 
in  progress  was  still  wilfully  fostering  ignorance, 
with  all  its  consequences  of  cruelty  and  misery.  All 
these  fantasies  were  advanced  without  any  sem- 
blance of  anger  or  malevolence,  Flora's  flashes  of 
excitement  being  reserved  for  moments  of  hope  and 
encouragement,  while  her  criticism  of  men  and 
things  was  delivered  always  in  reasoning,  half-in- 
terrogative tones,  with  droll  little  cocks  of  the  head, 
and  upward  glances  at  her  companion  under  lifted 
eyebrows.  On  the  tide  of  these  heresies  Henry 
floated  in  interested  contentment,  with  hardly  a  pro- 
test against  such  outrageous  nonsense ;  until  internal 
qualms  caused  him  at  last  to  draw  his  watch  from 
his  pocket,  and  make  an  astonished  mental  calcu- 
lation of  the  length  of  their  conversation. 

"  I  say,  Flora,"  he  said,  conscious  as  he  spoke 
that,  since  he  had  been  permitted  to  use  the  name, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     221 

he  had  been  playing  with  it  in  almost  every  sentence 
he  addressed  to  her,  as  a  child  with  a  new  toy.  "  I 
don't  like  to  interrupt  you  when  you're  painting, 
but  what  time  do  you  generally  lunch  ?  " 

"  Oh,  I'm  sorry !  "  Flora  cried,  apologetically. 
"Why  didn't  you  protest  before?  I  eat  at  all 
sorts  of  time;  whenever  I  feel  the  spirit  moves  me, 
so  to  speak.  I  haven't  any  regular  meal-hours.  I 
do  hope  you're  not  starving,  are  you?  What's 
the  time?" 

"  Twenty  past  two.  I  am  rather  hungry,"  he 
admitted.  "  Won't  you  come  and  lunch  with  me 
somewhere,  Flora?  Then  we  could  come  back  and 
finish  the  sitting." 

"  I  can't  spare  this  afternoon ;  there's  some  work 
I  must  finish  for  Williams  and  Lloyd.  I'd  no  idea 
it  was  so  late.  But  I  shan't  want  you  any  more 
now;  I  can  finish  it  off  without  you.  Will  you 
leave  the  frame  to  me,  or  would  you  like  to  look 
in  at  Chenil's  and  choose  one  ?  " 

"  You'ld  do  that  better  than  I  could,"  Henry  re- 
plied. "  But  I  s'pose  you  don't  live  entirely  on 
air  and  Causes,  do  you?  Won't  you  come  and 
have  something  to  eat  with  me?  I  want  to  hear 
more  about  your  socialist  society,  and  perhaps  I 
mayn't  catch  you  alone  again  for  some  little  while." 

"  All  right,  certainly,"  Flora  said,  hastily  cast- 
ing aside  her  long  linen  painting-robe,  and  emerg- 
ing from  it  a  slender,  maidenly  figure  in  dark  blue 


222     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

serge.  "  I'll  just  wash,  and  then  I'm  ready. 
You  go  on  in  front." 

Outdoors,  it  was  one  of  the  warm,  damp  days 
that  often  come  in  the  early  part  of  November; 
and  Flora,  when  she  ran  downstairs  to  join  Henry 
on  the  pavement,  had  not  altered  her  indoor  garb 
except  to  the  extent  of  covering  her  soft,  bright 
hair  with  one  of  the  untrimmed  felt  hats  which 
she  generally  affected.  Henry  was,  as  usual,  ele- 
gantly appointed,  and,  even  in  his  present  Bohemian 
frame  of  mind,  could  have  wished  that  his  friend 
had  decorated  herself  with  a  little  more  care. 
There  was  hardly  anybody  he  knew  likely  to  be 
lunching  at  any  of  the  smart  places;  but  there  were, 
of  course,  Americans  and  other  foreigners ;  and  the 
personnel  of  his  favourite  restaurants  naturally 
knew  him  well.  However,  Flora  looked  boyishly 
pretty  and  fresh,  and  would  pass  at  a  pinch  for  a 
country  cousin,  he  reflected. 

"  Where's  the  nearest  place  that  we  can  get  a 
taxi  ?  "  he  asked. 

"  What  do  you  want  one  for  ?  "  she  replied,  in 
the  Scottish  manner. 

"  I  thought  we'd  drive  down  to  the  Carlton," 
he  explained.  "  They  can  produce  quite  a  good 
vegetarian  meal  there.  I  know  that,  because  I 
dined  there  once  in  the  same  party  as  the  Duchess 
of  Dartmoor;  she  goes  in  for  grass,  you  know." 

"  Where  is  it  ?  "  enquired  the  painter. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     223 

"  The  Carlton?  "  he  said,  staring.  "  At  the  bot- 
tom of  the  Haymarket ;  on  Pall  Mall." 

"  Oh,  that  big  hotel.  I  know ! "  said  Flora. 
"  Good  gracious !  I'm  not  going  all  that  way. 
There's  a  shop  round  the  corner  in  the  King's  Road, 
where  I  nearly  always  eat.  Let's  go  there." 

"What  sort  of  a  shop?"  Henry  said,  with  a 
sulky  hesitation,  for  he  was  something  of  an  ama- 
teur of  food  and  wine,  and  unusually  nice  as  to 
service  and  table  appointments,  as  well  as  the  com- 
pany among  which  he  sat.  "  What  sort  of  a  place, 
Flora?  Pretty  decent?" 

"  Quite,"  said  Flora,  carelessly.  "  You're  not 
particularly  greedy,  I  s'pose  ?  " 

"  I  don't  think  so,"  he  replied,  reluctantly.  "  So 
long  as  things  are  properly  served  — " 

"  Oh,  you'll  find  this  all  right,"  she  assured  him. 
"  It's  one  of  Baer's  ordinary  bun-shops,  you 
know." 

Henry  felt  a  distinct  shudder  run  through  him. 
If,  as  he  had  said,  he  was  not  greedy,  at  least,  like 
most  idle  people,  he  was  a  good  deal  interested  in 
his  meals,  and  the  giving  and  partaking  of  lunches 
and  dinners,  the  discovery  of  new  and  amusing 
restaurants,  and  the  slow  degustation  of  dishes  and 
wine,  followed  by  leisurely  smoking  and  coffee 
drinking,  formed  no  inconsiderable  part  of  his  or- 
dinary diversion  in  life.  He  felt  that  he  had  en- 
couiitered  in  Flora  a  person  who  regarded  drink- 


224     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

ing  and  eating  as  merely  preventatives  of  thirst  and 
hunger,  and  was  unaware  that  dining  wisely  may 
be  a  fine  art  and  an  amusement;  and  he  shuddered 
again  in  anticipation  of  the  entertainment  that  she 
was  preparing  for  him.  Like  all  Londoners,  he 
was  acquainted  with  the  exterior  of  Baer's  many 
shops,  out  of  the  conduct  of  which  the  enterprising 
German  was  making  a  large  and  well-deserved  for- 
tune. If  only  as  the  first  discoverer  of  the  fact 
that  it  is  possible  to  provide  mankind,  for  two- 
pence, with  a  cup  of  reasonably  good  tea,  freshly 
made  with  boiling  water,  Herr  Baer  had 
earned  a  statue  better  than  most  of  the  actual 
recipients  of  that  honour,  now  dismally  displayed 
in  the  streets  of  London;  not  that,  among  such  a 
sorry  herd  of  mediocre  monarchs,  second-rate  sol- 
diers and  forgotten  politicians,  that  is  saying  much. 
D'Albiac  had  glanced  casually  in  more  than  once 
through  the  open  doors  of  these  establishments,  and 
had  been  dimly  aware  of  close-set  tables  at  which 
silent  hordes  of  pallid  men  and  women,  mostly 
young  and  the  reverse  of  smart,  ate  hastily,  gener- 
ally with  a  newspaper  and  a  breakfast  cup  beside 
them  —  peculiar  adjuncts  to  one's  lunch;  while 
quaintly  capped  and  aproned  maidens,  with  warm 
haste,  fled  continually  between  the  serried  ranks  of 
guests,  laden  with  trays  of  high  piled  plates  and 
dishes.  These  were  the  adequate  but  unappetising 
resorts  of  the  proletariat,  he  had  thought;  but  it 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     225 

had  hardly  occurred  to  him  as  conceivable  that  he 
would  ever  pass  through  their  portals.  And  yet, 
as  a  lamb  to  the  slaughter,  he  was  being  led  away 
unprotesting,  in  words  at  least,  by  this  unconcerned 
young  woman,  who  did  not  even  seem  to  realise 
that  there  could  be  any  objection  in  the  mind  of  any 
reasonable  person  to  such  a  house  of  call. 

Baer's  was  nearly  deserted  by  the  time  they  ar- 
rived, although  plain  evidence  of  the  numbers  that 
had  been  recently  fed  was  provided  in  the  heated  and 
occasionally  irritable  faces  of  the  waitresses,  and 
in  the  debris  and  soiled  utensils  under  which  the 
small  tables,  good,  sturdy  marble  though  they  were, 
fairly  groaned.  Flora  led  the  way  down  the  room 
to  a  corner  where,  she  explained,  the  waitress  was 
a  friend  of  hers;  and  Henry,  bashfully  following 
in  secret  rebellion,  sat  down  gingerly  beside  her 
at  a  table,  which,  to  his  disgust,  was  not  even 
cleared  for  their  reception;  but  remained  covered 
with  little  plates,  bearing  the  remains  of  rolls, 
cakes,  broken  egg  shells,  and  even,  horrible  to  re- 
late, cold  bones  and  congealed  gravy.  His  com- 
panion, however,  seemed  unaware  of  his  disgust, 
which  obviously  she  did  not  share,  passing  him  a 
bill  of  fare,  over  which  some  careless  guest  had 
previously,  it  seemed,  spilt  coffee,  without  any 
comment.  It  was  unmanly  to  be  finical,  he  felt; 
and  yet  he  could  not  deny  that  his  temper  was  im- 
paired by  his  surroundings,  and  by  the  renewed 


226     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

conviction  that  Flora  was  a  common,  sloppy  little 
thing,  to  tolerate  such  unrefined  circumstances. 

"Can't  we  get  these  things  taken  away?"  he 
asked,  rather  irritably. 

"  Ethel'll  be  here  in  a  minute,"  Flora  replied, 
calmly;  and  fell  into  a  rapid  perusal  of  a  crumpled 
evening  paper  left  by  some  previous  visitor  on  the 
chair  beside  her,  while  Henry,  fretting  at  every  un- 
necessary moment  spent  in  this  inacceptable  spot, 
glanced  savagely  at  a  beast  of  a  man,  three  tables 
off,  who,  having  clearly  enjoyed  his  repast,  was 
living  it  over  again  in  memory,  sucking  his  teeth 
with  an  audible  sound  of  relish,  and  blandly  un- 
conscious of  the  distaste  with  which  he  was  be- 
ing regarded. 

A  friendly  young  person,  who  greeted  Flora  with 
a  radiant  smile  as  "  quite  a  stranger  "  and  remained 
in  private  and  personal  conversation  with  her  for 
several  very  long  minutes,  having  taken  their 
orders,  Mrs.  Evans  lunched  vaguely  off  a  Welsh 
rabbit,  abundant  conversation  and  a  cup  of  coffee; 
while  D'Albiac,  chary  of  risking  anything  but  the 
simplest  fare,  consumed  some  poached  eggs  and 
toast  rather  sulkily.  The  undisturbed  good- 
humour  of  his  companion  and  her  gay  laughter 
finally  melted  him,  however,  particularly  after  the 
departure  of  the  cud-chewing  luncher  and  the  gen- 
eral clearing  and  swabbing  with  damp  cloths  of  the 
surrounding  tables.  The  food,  too,  was  quite  good, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     227 

so  far  as  it  went,  and  by  the  time  he  pulled  out 
his  cigarette  case  he  felt  more  at  peace  with  the 
world. 

"  You  mustn't  smoke  up  here,"  Flora  informed 
him.  "  Besides  I  must  get  back  as  soon  as  I've  had 
a  little  fresh  air.  Come  for  a  stroll  by  the  river 
with  your  cigarette,  will  you  ?  " 

He  agreed,  heartily  and,  as  they  left  the  shop, 
glanced  with  curiosity  at  the  clock  on  the  wall. 
Twelve  minutes,  including  at  least  three  wasted  in 
conversation  with  Ethel,  about  "  Ma  "  and  her  own 
health  and  her  young  brother  on  the  Tube  Railway ! 
And  this  was  called  a  meal!  However,  he  had  in- 
vited Flora  to  lunch,  and  so  insisted  in  taking  her 
bill  from  her  when  they  reached  the  cash  desk, 
rather  sorry  he  had  made  so  much  fuss  about  it 
when  he  saw  that  the  amount  to  be  discharged  was 
five  pence.  Flora,  however,  thanked  him  politely; 
and  as  she  seemed  quite  unaware  of  any  humour  in 
the  situation,  he  refrained  from  calling  her  atten- 
tion to  it,  and  followed  her  out  into  Kings  Road, 
and  thence  by  a  narrow  passage  on  to  the  embank- 
ment. 


IX 

DOWN  by  the  Thames  the  afternoon  was  warm  and 
misty;  and  a  white  woolly  vapour  rolled  heavily 
off  the  surface  of  the  water,  and  was  carried  by  an 
imperceptible  stirring  of  the  air  south-west,  in 
whorls  and  wreaths,  over  the  dimly-descried 
squalor  of  Wandsworth.  The  tide  was  flowing 
swiftly,  swirling  and  foaming  tumultuously  about 
the  piers  of  Battersea  Bridge,  as  Flora  and  Henry 
set  foot  on  it.  Flora  had  dropped  the  subjects  of 
sociology  and  politics  since  lunch,  and  after  fall- 
ing into  a  brief  mood  of  silence,  during  which  she 
seemed  unconscious  of  her  companion's  presence 
and  gazed  out  dreamily,  over  the  smoothly  gliding 
river,  at  the  lazy  mist-ghosts  that  fled  from  before 
their  footsteps,  she  began  to  talk  of  pictures.  The 
Barbizon  School  was,  it  seemed,  one  of  her  pas- 
sions; and  Henry  was  unreasonably  abashed  that 
he  was  so  ill-informed  about  this  manifestation  of 
the  art  of  his  own  country,  in  various  other  de- 
partments of  which  he  had  from  time  to  time  en- 
deavoured to  rouse  her  interest;  conscious  that 
under  her  polite  air  of  attention  and  enquiry  she 
was  emotionally  unmoved.  Post-naturalist  fiction 
did  not  seem  to  stir  her;  the  names  of  Rene  Bazin 
and  Bourget  moved  her  to  no  comment;  even  Ana- 

228 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     229 

tole  France  only  aroused  a  moderate  interest;  the 
present-day  painters  she  had  had,  she  admitted,  little 
opportunity  of  studying;  and  indeed  Henry  knew 
nothing  of  them  himself.  The  genius  of  Rodin 
she  seemed  to  acknowledge  with  unexpressed  private 
reservations ;  and  the  revolutionary  modern  French 
musicians,  with  the  names  of  whom  he  confidently 
approached  her,  received  merely  an  unresponsively 
courteous  welcome.  It  was  unfortunate  that  her 
obviously  real  enthusiasm  should  be  reserved  for 
the  work  of  men  with  whose  names,  of  course,  he 
was  extremely  familiar,  but  of  whose  actual 
achievements  he  had  only  a  vague  impression  in 
his  memory.  By  dint  of  a  delicately  reticent  adroit- 
ness he  flattered  himself  that  he  partially  concealed 
this  ignorance,  encouraging  her  with  nods  of  ac- 
quiescence and  occasional  discreet  questions  to  open 
her  heart  to  him  on  the  subject.  Flora  might  not 
be  entirely  deceived  by  this,  perhaps,  but  at  least 
she  continued  the  conversation ;  and  it  was  so  pleas- 
ant to  lean  side  by  side,  elbow  touching  elbow  on 
the  parapet  of  the  bridge,  gazing  down  on  the  grey- 
yellow  water  that  slid  away  and  boiled  beneath 
their  feet,  and  giving  an  occasional  side-glance  at 
her  swiftly  changing  colour  and  busy  lips,  as  she 
discoursed  rapturously  of  Daubigny.  Rousseau, 
Diaz  and  Corot;  turning  her  face  quickly  to  him 
from  time  to  time  to  ask  if  he  remembered  some 
picture  of  which  she  was  speaking.  Henry  felt 


230     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

that  he  could  pass  hours  in  perfect  contentment  in 
this  opaline,  vague  atmosphere,  undisturbed  except 
by  the  rare  passage  of  a  cart  over  the  bridge,  with 
the  soft,  clear  voice  mingling  with  the  gurgling  and 
plashing  of  the  stream,  charged  with  an  affectionate 
friendship  that  was  better  than  all  the  wild  rap- 
tures and  wilder  agonies  of  the  love  from  which  he 
had  lately  emerged.  Lazily  he  stroked  and  patted 
the  idea  of  a  life  passed  amid  such  peaceful  and 
pleasant  companions,  and  half  regretted,  although 
without  any  bitterness,  the  fate  that  had  forced 
his  steps  into  higher  paths.  It  would  be  good,  he 
thought,  to  be  one  of  these  irresponsible  artists, 
harassed  by  no  idea  of  any  greater  destiny,  living 
a  hand-to-mouth  Henri  Murger  existence  (in  his 
present  mood,  a  thoroughly  Bowdlerised  Vie  de 
Boheme)  among  the  studios  of  Chelsea ;  and  under 
the  spell  of  these  dreams  it  seemed  to  him  that  to- 
bacco had  never  tasted  so  good  as  it  did  in  this 
brief  loitering  on  Battersea  Bridge  on  this  quiet 
November  afternoon. 

Flora,  however,  before  long  broke  up  his  luxuri- 
ously idle  mood  by  an  enquiry  about  her  constant 
tyrant,  time,  and  revealed  a  guilty  surprise  on  hear- 
ing the  hour. 

"  Your  society's  too  agreeable,  Henry,"  she  said, 
regretfully,  "  or  else  I  enjoy  the  sound  of  my  own 
voice  too  much;  for  it  doesn't  seem  to  me  that 
I've  let  you  speak.  I  must  hurry  back.  Shall  I 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     231 

leave  you  here?  I  know  you  hate  walking  fast, 
don't  you?" 

He  pleaded  to  be  allowed  to  escort  her  to  her 
door,  and  they  turned  to  leave  the  bridge.  Chel- 
sea Embankment  was  almost  deserted,  except  for 
a  little  party  of  poorly  dressed  children  who  were 
playing  by  the  river  parapet,  just  above  the  bridge. 

"  Look  at  those  wicked  urchins !  "  Flora  cried, 
laughing,  as  they  approached  this  noisy  group.  "  I 
can't  think  how  Chelsea  children  aren't  drowned  in 
scores  every  day.  I  never  pass  here  without  see- 
ing some  of  these  monkeys  climbing  on  the  wall, 
and  balancing  themselves  on  one  leg  over  the  river." 

"  There's  a  boy  now  practising  his  rope-walk- 
ing," Henry  added.  "  Oh,  they  hardly  ever  come 
to  any  harm.  It's  only  losing  confidence  that  makes 
one  fall,  you  know.  Look  at  the  risks  drunkards 
and  sleep-walkers  take,  without  being  any  the  worse 
for  it." 

"  I  s'pose  that's  so,"  Flora  agreed,  as  they 
turned  off  the  bridge,  her  eyes,  as  she  spoke,  still 
resting  on  the  youthful  acrobat.  "  And  yet  you'd 
think  that  now  and  then,  with  the  best  nerve  in 
world,  one's  foot  would  slip  on  the  wet  —  My 
goodness!  He's  in!" 

Henry  had  not  been  regarding  the  children  of 
whom  they  spoke  during  the  past  few  seconds,  his 
eyes  having  wandered  again  to  Flora's  face,  a  habit 
which  they  seemed  to  have  acquired.  All  he  was 


232     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

conscious  of,  therefore,  was  her  sudden  cry,  be- 
fore she  had  bounded  away  from  his  side,  clat- 
tered down  the  stone  steps,  and  was  scudding  along 
the  embankment,  as  he  remembered  to  have  seen 
her  run  that  summer  day  in  Battersea  Park.  The 
surprise  to  Henry's  less  alert  mind  was  so  great 
that  before  he  even  realised  the  meaning  of  her 
words,  she  was  perhaps  twenty  yards  further  down 
the  river  bank,  had  flung  herself  bodily  on  to  the 
top  of  the  wall  that  guarded  the  edge,  rolled  over 
and  over  across  it  before  his  astonished  eyes,  like 
a  shot  rabbit,  and  disappeared  in  a  bundle,  with  a 
prodigious  splash,  beneath  the  surface  of  the  water. 
The  next  instant  with  a  loud,  hoarse,  wordless  cry 
that  seemed  to  tear  his  heart  up  by  the  roots, 
Henry  had  rushed  in  pursuit  of  her,  ploughed  his 
was  through  a  screaming  party  of  terrified  children, 
and  reached  the  edge  of  the  river  in  time  to  see 
Flora's  almost  unrecognisable  head,  black-haired, 
hatless  and  of  a  seal-like  smoothness,  emerge  from 
the  surface  directly  in  the  path  of  another  and 
smaller  figure  that  drifted  down  swiftly  towards 
her,  tumbling  over  in  the  stream,  disappearing  and 
reappearing,  and  on  one  occasion  displaying  mo- 
mentarily an  agonised  face,  from  the  open  mouth 
of  which  proceeded  an  inarticulate  and  gurgling 
scream  that  was  instantly  drowned  again  by  the 
smoothly  gliding,  yellow  waters.  Before  the  sound 
of  it  was  lost  the  little,  submerged  body  had  come 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     233 

in  contact  with  the  upright  form  of  Flora,  who  was 
steadying  herself  against  the  flow  of  the  tide,  and 
she  had  clapped  her  arms  tightly  about  it,  lifting  the 
head  above  the  water  and  holding  it  pressed  against 
her  own  face.  At  the  same  instant  she  looked  up 
at  the  bank  and  perceived  D'Albiac  clambering  on  to 
the  low  wall. 

"  Don't  come,"  she  cried  in  a  clear,  high  voice. 
"All  right!  I've  got  him!" 

By  this  time  Henry  was  kneeling  on  the  coping, 
and  the  words  barely  stopped  him  before  he  plunged 
into  the  stream.  In  his  agonising  excitement  he 
could  find  no  breath  or  voice  for  speech,  but  the 
horror  expressed  in  his  face  and  outstretched  hands 
was  obvious  to  Flora,  even  in  her  difficult  position. 

"  All  right !  "  she  cried  again.  "  Drifting  on  to 
—  steps."  Her  mouth  went  under  water  for  a  mo- 
ment, but  she  emerged  the  next,  still  clinging  to  her 
burden,  and  added,  "  Treading  water.  Don't 
come !  " 

There  was  a  confidence  in  the  tone  of  her  cries 
which  convinced  Henry  that  she  was  not  in  imme- 
diate extremity,  and,  leaping  off  the  wall,  he  rushed 
to  the  flight  of  iron  steps  leading  down  to  the  water, 
towards  which  the  two  shining  heads  closely  pressed 
against  each  other,  were  rapidly  floating.  With- 
out loosing  the  hold  of  her  arms,  Flora  was  edg- 
ing herself,  by  movements  of  her  feet,  close  under 
the  embankment,  so  that  by  the  time  Henry  had 


234     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

reached  the  river  level,  she  was  carried  gently  on  to 
the  stairway,  instantly  to  be  seized  by  Henry  be- 
neath the  arms  and  lifted,  with  her  rescued  child, 
into  a  position  of  safety. 

"  Take  the  boy,"  she  said,  breathlessly.  "  I'm 
all  right  now;  I'm  on  the  steps." 

Henry  picked  up  the  streaming  urchin,  who  in- 
stantaneously broke  into  renewed  screams  and  sobs ; 
and,  holding  him  against  his  immaculately  coated 
bosom,  carried  him  swiftly  up  to  the  embankment, 
where  he  put  him  down  on  his  feet  among  his  lit- 
tle friends,  who  were  gathered  at  the  top  of  the 
steps,  with  pallid  and  tear-stained  faces. 

"  You  little  idiot !  "  Henry  cried  furiously  to  the 
sobbing  urchin.  "  Why  on  earth  must  you  play 
the  fool  on  the  wall  like  that?  You  might  have 
drowned  the  lady.  Your  father  ought  to  give  you 
a  good  thrashing." 

Gurgling  gasps  and  streaming  tears  were  the  un- 
fortunate child's  only  reply;  and  a  little  girl,  who 
was  apparently  in  charge  of  the  party,  herself 
about  eleven  years  of  age,  took  up  the  indict- 
ment. 

"  Yer  naughty  boy,  Orris !  What'll  yer  muvver 
sy?  Where's  yer  cap?  Yer've  bin  an  lost  it. 
You'll  catch  it  when  yer  get  ome,  yer  naughty 
boy!" 

To  relieve  her  excessive  agitation  she  seized  the 
delinquent  by  his  collar,  and,  still  weeping  herself, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     235 

began  to  cuff  him  heartily.  In  the  meantime 
Flora,  pathetically  small  and  bedraggled  in  appear- 
ance, with  her  thin  blue  dress  clinging  and  stream- 
ing about  her  slender  body,  and  her  drenched, 
smooth  hair  dripping  round  her  face,  had  squelched 
her  way  up  the  steps  and  now  joined  the  party. 

"  Oh,  don't  hit  him !  "  she  cried.  "  Poor  mite ! 
He  couldn't  help  it!  Never  mind,  Horace,"  she 
continued,  rescuing  him  from  the  hands  of  the 
avenger,  who  still  blubbered  and  abused  him  sotto 
voce.  "  Don't  cry,  dear.  Mother  won't  scold 
you.  My  friend  will  go  home  with  you  and  tell 
her  not  to;  won't  you,  Henry?  Or  would  you 
rather  come  with  me  and  have  your  clothes  dried, 
and  then  mother  needn't  know  ?  " 

"  Want  to  go  'ome  to  Muvver,"  sobbed  Horace 
in  a  desperate  crescendo. 

"  That's  a  brave  man,"  Flora  said,  bending  over 
him  consolingly.  "  He  can't  be  frightened  of  her, 
or  he  wouldn't  say  that,"  she  said,  aside  to  Henry. 
"Take  the  poor  tiny  home,  will  you?  Where  do 
you  live,  Horace  dear?" 

Horace  could  only  shake  a  dejected  head,  but 
his  friends  joined  in,  in  a  sort  of  chorus. 

"Ashley  buildings,  Miss!" 

"  Oh,  the  model  dwellings !  I  know,"  said  Flora. 
"  Milman  street,  Henry.  The  children  will  show 
you  the  way.  You  don't  mind?  " 

Poor  Henry,  gasping  and  half  in  tears,  was  still 


236     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

staring  at  the  little  drowned  rat  that  represented  his 
friend.  He  had  no  idea  that  he  could  have  been  so 
utterly  and  helplessly  terrified  at  the  sight  of  hu- 
man life  in  danger;  and  he  made  a  shameful  effort 
to  say  something  in  reply,  to  pull  himself  together 
and  be  helpful;  conscious  that  his  own  part  in  the 
late  proceedings  had  had  little  chance  of  being 
heroic. 

"  Flora !  "  he  stammered,  in  a  faint,  breathless 
voice;  and  then  after  a  pause  of  a  few  seconds, 
"  But  you  —  you're  — " 

"  Oh,  I'm  all  right !  "  she  answered,  in  a  matter- 
of-fact  way,  as  if  she  had  just  designedly  arrived 
by  water  to  meet  him.  "  It's  only  a  step  to  my 
place  and  dry  clothes,  and  then  I'm  none  the  worse. 
But  I  don't  want  this  poor  baby  smacked.  Go  with 
him,  will  you  ?  " 

"  Of  course,"  said  Henry,  moving  off  slowly  with 
the  party  of  children,  whose  fears  had  been  changed 
by  this  time  into  a  round-eyed  curiosity  and  ad- 
miration of  their  splendidly  attired  and  distin- 
guished escort. 

"  'E's  lost  'is  cap,  Miss,"  the  leader  of  the  party 
repeated  suggestively. 

"  So've  I,"  said  Flora,  laughing.  "  We're  in  the 
same  boat  there,  Horace.  Never  mind,  he  shall 
have  another.  Give  him  a  shilling,  for  me,  to  buy 
one,  Henry.  And  hurry  him  home  now,  or  he'll 
catch  a  cold.  What  luck  that  it's  a  warm  day! 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     237 

Good-bye,  Henry.     Look  in  to-morrow,  if  you've 
nothing  better  to  do." 

So  saying  she  extricated  herself  from  a  little 
gaping  group  of  adult  spectators,  that  had  silently 
gathered  about  her  in  the  past  few  minutes,  and  set 
off  for  her  rooms  at  a  fast  walk,  while  Henry,  who, 
like  most  Frenchmen,  was  by  nature  fond  of  chil- 
dren and  was  at  present  too  shaken  to  think  of  ap- 
pearances, took  Horace's  damp  little  hand  and  led 
him  back  to  his  home,  where  the  splendour  of  this 
unexpected  apparition,  and  the  unnecessarily  large 
sums  of  money,  bestowed  as  consolatory  presents 
on  the  penitent  scapegrace,  made  Horace's  mother, 
so  far  from  beating  him,  regard  him  as  a  hero  and 
benefactor;  and  provided  that  hard-working  young 
woman  not  only  with  an  unaccustomed  supper  of 
sausages  for  her  entire  family,  but  material  for 
much  boastfully  redundant  conversation  with  her 
neighbours. 

"'Ah!  Are  you  this  little  feller's  mother?'  'e 
says;  and  he  smiles  that  beautiful  and  raises  'is 
'at.  So  I  says  '  Yus,'  I  says.  So  'e  says  '  I'm 
afraid  'e's  got  'isself  into  trouble,'  'e  says.  So  I 
says  'Oh?'  I  says.  So  'e  says  '  Yus,'  'e  says,  '  but 
I  'opes,'  'e  says,  '  as  yer  won't  be  'ard  on  'im,'  'e 
says." 

It  would  be  supererogatory  to  set  out  the  moth- 
er's account,  in  confused  oratio  obliqua,  of  the  ac- 
cident, or  record  the  imaginary  speeches  that  she 


238     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

put  into  her  own  mouth,  as  being  her  ready  replies 
to  this  fascinating  and  magnificent  stranger;  but 
they  were  enough  to  make  her  the  envy  of  Milman 
Street  for  many  days,  while  Horace,  among  his 
own  set,  succeeded  in  time  in  imparting  the  notion, 
and  himself  believing,  that  it  would  be  more  ac- 
curate to  state  that  it  was  he  that  saved  the  lidy, 
rather  than  that  the  lidy  had  rendered  him  any  par- 
ticular service  by  injudiciously  following  him  into 
the  water. 

His  duty  in  respect  of  the  rescued  child  dis- 
charged, D'Albiac  put  himself  into  a  cab  and  in  a 
few  minutes  was  in  his  little  library  in  Cowley 
Street,  alone  with  his  newly-found,  exquisite  secret. 
The  few  crowded  seconds  of  horror  through  which 
he  had  passed,  while  he  believed  his  friend  to  be  in 
danger,  had  stripped  the  veils  from  a  fact  that,  it 
seemed,  should  have  been  patently  recognisable  in 
any  garb,  many  weeks  ago,  to  any  but  a  wilful  ob- 
scurantist. At  least  he  had  greeted  it  now,  and 
took  it  to  his  heart  in  the  first  moment  of  en- 
thusiasm without  a  thought  of  the  doleful  conse- 
quences that  such  an  acquaintanceship  might  in- 
volve. He  loved  Flora;  he  had  loved  her,  he  be- 
lieved, since  the  first  glimpse  of  that  pale,  tortured 
face  among  the  turmoil  of  the  street  riot;  but  cer- 
tainly, even  if  that  were  not  the  case,  since  that 
bright  summer  day  when  he  had  been  so  absurdly 
stiff  and  reticent  with  her  and  Chalmers  in  Bat- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     239 

tersea  Park.  How  was  it  that,  knowing  his  con- 
stant hunger  for  her  society,  he  had  yet  been  able 
to  deceive  himself  so  grossly  as  to  his  feelings  to- 
wards her,  and  keep  up  this  vain  pretence  of  a 
friendship,  calm,  unemotional  and  void  of  passion? 
In  that  interminable  instant  of  time,  before  she 
cried  out  her  reassurance  to  him  from  the  hurry- 
ing yellow  water,  he  had  recognised,  without  the 
least  surprise,  that  this  vivid,  flower-like  face,  slen- 
der body  and  kind,  soft  voice  were  everything  in 
the  world  to  him,  and  that  if  they  were  to  be  swept 
into  the  horror  of  the  shade  he  would  at  least  and 
instantly  follow  them  thither.  Dull  and  deaf  must 
he  have  been  to  refuse  to  hear  until  this  moment 
what  his  wise  heart  had,  for  so  many  weeks,  been 
crying  loudly  and  persistently  within  him.  He 
could  laugh  now,  with  a  happy  thrill  of  newly- 
learnt  wisdom,  as  he  reflected  upon  the  sophistries 
he  had  been  contented  to  accept  as  excuses  for  con- 
duct utterly  insane  and  incomprehensible,  but  for 
the  admission  of  his  love  for  Flora;  his  growing 
dissatisfaction  with  Patrice  and  his  unsympathetic 
relations  with  her;  his  craving  for  a  wider, 
acuter  vision  in  the  girl,  whose  beauty  had  at  first 
been  all-sufficient ;  his  sudden  and  absurd  desire  for 
a  portrait  of  himself;  his  boredom  among  his  usual 
associates  and  surroundings,  and  glad  anticipation 
of  the  quiet  hours  in  the  studio;  his  tolerance  of 
Flora's  odd  friends;  his  concealment  from  his  be- 


240     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

trothed  of  his  acquaintance  with  the  artist ;  his  quar- 
rels and  arguments  with  his  friends  on  subjects 
that  he  had,  all  his  life,  accepted  as  immutable  and 
unimprovable;  his  strangely  rapid  conversion  to 
humanitarian,  social  and  political  heresies  that  were 
anathema  to  most  of  his  own  class  and  repudiated 
unconsidered,  until  now,  by  himself.  In  the  dis- 
covery of  the  cause  of  these  rapid  alterations  in  his 
point  of  view,  he  found  himself  anxiously  consid- 
ering whether  his  unacknowledged  passion  had 
merely  blinded  his  judgment,  so  that  he  was  pre- 
pared to  accept  any  monstrosity  of  untruth  as  un- 
assailable fact,  so  long  as  it  was  enunciated  by  the 
lips  that  were  dear  to  him  and  in  the  tones  he 
adored.  Yet  he  could  not  think  it  was  so;  for  he 
was  unable  to  separate  Flora  from  her  opinions. 
He  knew  he  did  not  love  her,  as  for  instance  he  had 
loved  Patrice,  for  her  physical  attributes  only,  or 
even  mainly;  in  such  respects  no  doubt  his  be- 
trothed had  been  far  the  more  richly  endowed. 
On  one  side  was  a  notable  and  acknowledged 
beauty;  on  the  other  a  pretty,  but  by  no  means  re- 
markable, young  woman.  It  was  her  ideas  that  he 
loved;  it  was  the  rebel,  the  fighter  in  her  that 
stirred  his  very  soul;  it  was  the  passionate  pity 
within  the  frail,  womanly  body  that  made  her  blue 
eyes  the  only  eyes  in  the  world  for  him;  the  kind, 
cheerful  tolerance  that  gave  the  greatest  charm  to 
the  humorously  tender  lines  of  the  pure  mouth; 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     241 

the  strain  of  the  actively  heroic  that  lit  up  the  whole 
gay,  dimpled  face,  and  added  that  to  ordinary 
patiently  courageous  womanhood  which  is,  through 
millenniums  of  suppression,  the  one  last  supreme 
virtue  generally  lacking ;  that,  when  present  in  some 
exceptional  member  of  the  sex,  makes  her  the 
matchless  boast  of  humanity,  comparable  only  to 
those  few  great  men  in  whom  a  generous  admixture 
of  feminine  tenderness  has  softened  the  rough 
tyranny  of  man.  "  The  female  male  in  which  shall 
culminate  the  race "  Henry  repeated  to  himself, 
thoughtfully;  and  if  "God  in  the  garden  hid  his 
face  "  it  could  only  be  to  conceal  his  blushes  for 
having  failed  for  so  long  to  see  the  beautiful  possi- 
bility of  such  a  creature.  The  heroic!  It  was 
that,  above  all,  that  struck  home  to  the  enthusiastic 
heart  of  the  Frenchman,  member  of  a  race  whose 
national  ideal  is  the  lovely,  girlish  magnanimity  and 
courage  of  Jeanne  of  Domremy.  And  what  won- 
der that  he  should  have  accepted  her  leadership, 
much  as  rough  La  Hire  accepted  the  leadership  of 
the  Maid  herself,  in  sober  trust  that  a  nature  so 
sweet,  so  self-denying,  so  aspiring  could  at  least 
draw  one  on  to  no  mean  and  selfish  end;  that  such 
frank,  gentle  reasonableness  was  likely  to  be  a  true 
guide ;  one  that  it  would  be  foolish  and  masterful  to 
reject?  These  ideas  and  ideals  of  hers,  some  al- 
ready half  accepted  by  him,  others  still  clamour- 
ing confidently  for  acceptance  —  what  was  their 


242     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

ancestry?  And  why  were  they  to  be  so  easily  vic- 
torious over  his  own  prejudices?  One  and  all  they 
sprang  from  Compassion,  the  basis  of  the  great 
Buddhistic  and  primitive  Christian  beliefs,  the  in- 
spiration of  all  that  was,  to  Henry's  mind,  best  in 
modern  rationalistic  philosophy.  Admit  that  many 
of  them  might  ultimately  prove  impossible  of  at- 
tainment, Utopian,  Millennial;  none  the  less  they 
were  in  themselves  fine  and  noble  conceptions, 
worthy  of  something  better  than  the  scornfully 
smiling  rejection  without  examination,  which  was 
their  usual  fate,  at  least  in  the  circles  of  society  in 
which  he  moved;  deserving,  it  seemed  to  him,  of 
life-long  study  and  struggle,  in  the  hope  that  it 
might  one  day  prove  that  the  impossible  became 
possible;  the  unpractical  and  sentimental  the  high- 
est form  of  wisdom  and  racial  efficiency.  And  al- 
ready he  had  been  forced  to  admit  that  many  of  the 
difficulties  and  cloudy  barriers  with  which  they 
were  surrounded  were  artificial;  the  work  of  con- 
scious selfishness  at  times,  but  more  often  of  mere 
inertia,  the  desperate  resistance  to  movement  and 
change  that  is  the  master-passion  of  the  average 
human  being.  Henry  was  abashedly  aware  of  the 
presence  of  this  intellectual  sloth  and  cowardice  in 
his  own  nature.  How  likely  was  it,  he  reflected 
humbly,  that  he  would  ever  have  recognised  the 
mighty  possibilities  of  the  future  and  the  absolute 
obligation  on  all  men  and  women  to  contribute  their 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     243 

individual  push  at  the  great  wheel,  however  puny 
their  strength,  had  Flora's  personality  not  come 
haphazard  across  his  path? 

So,  with  the  requickened  memory  of  the  beloved 
woman  herself,  his  speculative  mood  passed,  and  he 
fell  into  the  ordinary  day-dreams  of  a  lover. 
Flora!  Flora!  He  repeated  the  name  to  himself 
a  hundred  times  aloud  in  his  comfortable  solitude, 
with  a  rapture  that  was  no  doubt  fatuous  enough. 
It  seemed  to  him  the  loveliest  name  borne  by 
woman;  worthy,  as  no  other  name  could  be,  of  that 
exquisitely  tinted  face,  that  was  itself  so  like  some 
fair  garden  rose,  and  of  the  whole  slender  delicacy 
of  the  lithe  body.  Thus  only,  indeed,  must  the 
goddess  of  flowers  and  the  gay  Springtime  have 
been  conceived  by  the  poets.  There  was  the 
requisite  dash  of  the  brave  and  adventurous  in  its 
sound,  too.  Flora  Macdonald  —  his  recollection 
of  the  exploits  of  this  famous  lady  was  not  alto- 
gether clear ;  but  at  least  he  was  confident  that  they 
were  of  a  gallant  and  self-sacrificing  character. 

Love  to  D'Albiac  was  a  serious  matter;  none  of 
the  tepid,  well-disciplined  emotions  that,  as  a  rule, 
are  the  forerunners  of  marriage.  Nor,  in  his  mind, 
had  it  any  necessary  association  with  the  domestic 
union.  Truly,  in  the  case  of  Patrice,  it  had  led 
him  to  make  the  approved  proposition;  for  the  love 
that  she  inspired  there  was  no  other  possible  end. 
In  a  previous  attack  of  the  same  madness,  in  his 


244     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

own  country,  the  object  being  of  inferior  class,  his 
passion  had  conducted  to  an  irregular  communion, 
broken  off,  after  a  couple  of  years,  at  the  cost  of 
some  tears  and  various  economic  arrangements. 
For  the  present  at  least  neither  of  these  ends  oc- 
curred to  his  mind  as  desirable;  indeed  they  hardly 
presented  themselves  at  all.  ,  Had  they  done  so,  the 
second  would  have  been  rejected  at  once,  as  un- 
worthy of  association,  even  mentally,  with  Flora; 
while  the  first,  although  it  would  have  struck  his  re- 
lations and  friends  as  impossibly  absurd  and  repre- 
hensible, might,  in  the  excitement  of  the  moment, 
have  received  perfectly  serious  and  careful  consid- 
eration. But  so  far  the  conception  of  the  beloved 
object  in  his  mind  was  so  entirely  spiritual  and  re- 
moved from  the  usual  emotions  of  sex,  that  he  had 
no  other  thought  or  desire  than  to  be  allowed  to  be 
enrolled  as  a  humble  friend  and  disciple,  amply  re- 
warded by  a  gay  smile  of  comradeship,  or  by  one 
of  her  stirring  phrases  of  encouragement  and  en- 
thusiasm. His  earliest  feeling  towards  her,  one  of 
distrust  and  disaffection  for  her  opinions,  warring 
with  invincible  attraction  to  her  personality,  had 
thus  by  this  time  almost  entirely  boxed  the  compass. 
Flora  had  become  to  him  the  symbol  of  human 
ideals  and,  as  such,  her  personality  was  at  times  al- 
most forgotten;  and  his  most  constant  present  un- 
easiness was  due  to  the  feeling  that  he  was  still  so 
far  removed  from  her  in  comprehension  and  dar- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     245 

ing;  so  slow-witted,  unworthy,  narrow  and  cow- 
ardly. What  must  she  think  of  a  young  man 
who  was  such  a  slave  to  the  opinion  of  his  class,  so 
selfishly  averse  from  putting  himself  to  any  per- 
sonal inconvenience  in  a  noble  cause?  How  swift 
and  brave  she  was,  this  weak  slip  of  a  woman,  who 
exposed  herself  voluntarily  to  the  brutality  of 
angry,  fighting  crowds;  gladly  underwent  the 
cruelties  and  privations  of  prison;  flung  herself 
without  the  hesitation  of  a  moment  into  a  swirling 
river,  for  the  sake  of  a  ragged  child;  lost  friends, 
money,  reputation,  and  invited  coarse  insult,  tyranny 
and  stupid  contempt  for  the  thing  that  she  believed 
to  be  right!  The  memory  of  that  small,  drowned 
figure,  black-haired,  shivering  and  dismally  drip- 
ping and  squelching,  as  it  bent  with  lovely  mother- 
liness  over  the  unfortunate  ragamuffin  that  it  had 
snatched  from  death,  was  dearer  and  more  beauti- 
ful to  his  mental  vision  than  the  fairest  image  of 
his  flaming-haired,  statuesque  Patrice,  in  all  the 
artistry  of  her  wonderful  raiment.  How  she  would 
have  clasped  her  pretty,  helpless  hands,  and  called 
ineffectually  on  her  maman,  while  the  child 
drowned;  useless  as  he  himself,  who  was  capable 
of  letting  the  disaster  end  while  he  hung  in  inde- 
cision !  "  Don't  cry,  dear ! "  The  little  phrase 
persistently  haunted  his  mind,  with  its  soft,  sooth- 
ing gentleness,  and  that  faintly  discernible  North- 
ern intonation  which  added  a  kindly  charm  to  the 


246     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

endearment.  So  about  and  about  the  common- 
place and  undistinguished  figure  of  the  painter 
Henry  wandered  ceaselessly,  viewing  it  from  every 
point,  and  finding  ever,  in  his  enthusiasm,  new  and 
admirable  qualities  and  fresh  reasons  for  his  de- 
termination to  be  worthy  of  her  friendship  and  to 
keep  it  for  his  own,  even  at  the  cost  of  losing  every- 
thing else  that  he  had,  until  now,  held  dear. 

Sleep  did  not  cure  or  weaken  his  obsession;  nor, 
as  the  days  passed,  did  time  affect  it,  further  than 
to  strengthen  his  confident  belief  that  his  life  was 
inseverably  bound  to  Flora's.  It  was  now  his  main 
object  to  remodel  his  mind  on  hers ;  and  he  frankly 
accepted  the  position  of  pupil,  which  he  would  have 
before  proudly  rejected  in  relation  to  any,  even  the 
greatest,  of  instructors;  glad  only  to  be  able  to  be 
of  service  in  small  matters  to  his  mistress.  The 
obedience  of  his  attitude  amused  her  at  first,  but, 
before  long,  roused  her  to  a  friendly  remon- 
strance. 

"  I  don't  know  what's  come  over  you,  Henry," 
she  said,  laughing  at  his  servile  acceptance  of  some 
proposition  that  she  herself  realised  to  be  highly  de- 
batable. "  I  think  the  society  of  us  cranks  has 
knocked  all  the  spirit  out  of  you.  When  I  first 
knew  you,  you  were  a  most  contradictory  and  war- 
like person.  You  mustn't  get  into  the  other  ex- 
treme, and  believe  everything  we  tell  you,  without 
thinking." 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     247 

"  But  you're  always  right,"  he  replied,  in  per- 
fect good  faith. 

"  Oh,  no,  we're  not,"  Flora  said,  shaking  her 
head  vigorously.  "  Don't  you  see  we're  always 
disagreeing  among  ourselves  ?  In  fact,  there's  only 
one  point  in  which  I  feel  confident  that  we're  right, 
and  that  is  that  we  stir  each  other  up  to  argue 
things  out  and  quarrel  about  them,  instead  of  living 
entirely  on  phrases  acquired  from  our  grandparents. 
And  you've  got  to  help,  you  know.  Come  on,  let's 
quarrel  about  something !  " 

He  protested  that  he  would  have  no  chance  in 
such  an  encounter;  that,  moreover,  he  agreed  with 
everything  she  said;  but  his  friend  would  not  let 
him  off  in  that  way. 

"  You  don't,  you  wicked  humbug !  "  she  said  re- 
provingly. "  Just  think  of  the  things  you've  swal- 
lowed whole,  when  I've  offered  them  to  you  tenta- 
tively! Some  of  them  I've  hardly  believed  myself. 
And  yet  they  don't  seem  to  make  any  difference 
to  you." 

"  How  do  you  mean  ?  "  he  asked  with  an  uneasy 
prescience  of  her  reply. 

"  Well,  you're  still  quite  contented  to  be  idle  and 
luxurious.  It's  no  good  denying  it.  Spiritually 
you're  fat;  probably  one  day  you'll  be  so 
corporeally,  unless  you  reform  and  take  exercise. 
You  don't  want  to  remain  a  bull  of  Bashan,  do 
you?" 


248     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  You  know  that  I  intend  —  I  see  the  necessity 
' —  I'm  only  looking  about  —  I  quite  agree  with 
you,"  he  stammered,  knowing  the  accusation  to  be 
deserved. 

"  You  agree,  principally,  to  keep  me  quiet,  I  be- 
lieve," Flora  replied,  with  the  ruminative  twist  of 
her  mouth,  as  she  turned  her  clear-seeing  eyes  upon 
him.  They  were,  at  the  time,  in  his  gorgeous  little 
drawing-room,  where  he  had  persuaded  her  for  the 
first  time  to  be  his  guest  at  tea.  "  And  I'm  afraid 
you  don't  look  very  hard,  do  you?  You  haven't 
even  asked  me  if  I  can  suggest  anything  fpr  you  to 
do;  because  you  probably  know  I  could,  you  lazy 
person." 

It  was  true.  Henry  had  an  unacknowledged 
dread  of  some  extremely  inacceptable  job  being 
thrust  upon  him,  if  he  left  the  choice  to  Flora,  who 
seemed  to  have  little  sympathy  with  the  niceness 
acquired  from  his  upbringing.  He  was  very  com- 
fortable as  he  was ;  and  lacked  the  necessary  energy 
to  turn  theory,  of  his  own  initiative,  into  action. 

"  But  do  you  know  of  any  positions  ?  "  he  be- 
gan. 

"  Oh,  heaps.  You  see  the  question  of  means 
doesn't  arise;  and  there's  always  plenty  of  useful 
unpaid  work  going  begging." 

"  But  suitable  to  me  ?  "  he  urged,  nervously. 

"  Everything's  suitable  in  some  degree  to  every- 
body," Flora  declared.  "  That's  to  say  if  one's 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     249 

normal.  I  don't  mean  that  professional  football 
would  be  exactly  the  thing  for  you,  if  you'd  been 
born  without  any  legs.  But,  of  course,  there  are 
places  in  which  your  particular  powers  would  be 
more  useful  than  in  others.  Oh,  I'll  find  you  some- 
thing, if  you'll  let  me.  Don't  you  be  afraid  of 
that." 

"  Thank  you,"  he  said  humbly.  "  You  know  I 
want  to  be  some  good  in  the  world,  Flora.  I  hate 
you  to  think  of  me  as  fat." 

Indeed  he  writhed  in  spirit  at  the  picture  pre- 
sented of  graceless  pinguitude  wallowing  among  the 
fleshpots  in  the  midst  of  a  strenuous  world. 

Flora  laughed  delightedly  at  his  ruefulness;  and 
her  laughter  was  so  pretty  and  infectious  that  he 
joined  in  at  last,  with  a  sudden  insane  impulse  to 
take  her  in  his  arms  and  punish  her  mockery  with 
kisses.  It  was  the  first  time  that  such  a  desire  had 
manifested  itself  so  plainly  and  strongly;  and,  but 
that  he  felt  that  such  a  rough  and  unheralded  ac- 
tion would  probably  put  an  end  there  and  then  to 
their  friendship,  he  had  yielded  to  his  longing;  the 
force  of  which  sent  a  dark  flush  to  his  face. 

"  Poor  fellow !  What  a  shame  to  laugh  at  you," 
said  Flora  presently,  with  mock  contrition,  observ- 
ing his  change  of  colour  and  attributing  it,  prob- 
ably, to  wounded  vanity  or  anger.  "  But  you  are 
rather  a  hedonist,  aren't  you?  Think  of  you,  at 
your  age,  in  this  truly  charming  house!  Sofas 


250     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

and  armchairs,"  she  looked  about  the  room  for 
material  for  the  indictment,  "  beautiful  teacups  and 
silver ;  two  men  servants,  at  least,  for  I've  seen  them 
already;  several  maids,  I  s'pose;  probably  an  ex- 
pensive cook;  a  grand  piano;  your  great,  snorting 
motor  car;  lovely  clothes,"  she  dimpled  as  she  re- 
garded him.  "  Lots  of  fine  books  and  pictures ; 
velvet  curtains  —  all  for  one  young  man,  who  prob- 
ably only  spends  quite  an  insignificant  part  of  his 
day  here,  and  hasn't  done  one  stroke  of  useful  work 
in  his  life.  Oh,  it's  so  bad  for  you!  You  can't 
think  how  fattening  it  all  is !  " 

"What  d'you  want  me  to  do?"  he  asked,  rest- 
ively; for  he  was  well  aware  of  his  Sybaritic 
proclivities,  and  had  until  lately,  indeed,  made  a 
merit  of  them,  and  proclaimed  them,  candidly,  in 
society. 

"  I  ?  It's  not  for  me  to  exact  anything,  even  if 
I  could.  But  I  wonder  at  you  being  contented  to 
be  a  drone.  You're  capable  of  better  things  than 
that." 

"  But  if  one  happens  to  have  money  — "  he  pro- 
tested — "  It's  no  good  hoarding  it." 

"  But  surely  there  are  better  objects  to  spend  it 
on  than  gratifying  one's  senses.  I'm  not  thinking 
now  about  the  effect  on  others  —  for  the  actual 
sum's  insignificant  —  but  on  the  person  who  spends 
it.  Every  man's  a  potential  reformer;  and  the  rich 
have  the  greatest  chances  and  the  greatest  tempta- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     2-51 

tions  of  all,  of  course.  It  does  seem  odd,  to  one 
who  hasn't  been  put  in  the  position,  that  they  should 
almost  always  give  way  to  the  temptation,  and 
swamp  their  souls  in  eating  and  drinking  and  lying 
soft." 

"  But  then  you  admire  renunciation.  That's 
quite  a  bygone  creed,"  Henry  argued,  morally. 

"  I  admit  it,"  she  sighed,  "  but  it's  got  to  come 
back  again,  if  the  world's  to  go  forward  instead  of 
backward.  And  now  I'm  off;  I've  got  appoint- 
ment in  Oxford  Street  in  five-and-twenty  minutes." 

"  I  never  saw  such  a  person  to  run  about,"  he 
grumbled.  "  You  haven't  been  here  more  than  half 
an  hour.  When  shall  I  see  you  again?  May  I 
call  to-morrow  ?  " 

"  Not  to-morrow.  I've  got  a  meeting  in  the 
afternoon,  and  it'll  take  me  all  I  know  to  get 
through  my  work  before  it.  Friday,  I  promised  to 
spend  part  of  the  day  with  Adelaide  Perry.  Sat- 
urday afternoon,  Fred  Sutton's  coming  round  and 
Emily  Westbrook.  Would  you  like  to  come  too  ?  " 

"  I  will  if  I  can.  But  I  want  to  talk  to  you  by 
yourself,"  he  said  rather  sheepishly,  without  look- 
ing at  her.  "  I  really  do  mean  to  work,  Flora,  and 
I  want  to  discuss  it  with  you,  so  that  you  can  help 
me  to  find  some.  There's  something  going  on  at 
the  Opera  next  week  —  German  music,  I  believe. 
Would  you  like  to  come  some  evening  with  me,  and 
have  some  supper  afterwards?  " 


252     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"Yes.  That'll  be  nice.  Let's  see  —  Meister- 
singer's  on  Tuesday;  I  could  manage  that." 

"  I'll  take  a  couple  of  stalls,"  said  Henry  grate- 
fully. 

"  Not  stalls,  I  beg.  I  can't  stand  the  lower  part 
of  the  house.  There's  a  sort  of  sympathetic  bore- 
dom all  over  it  that's  quite  destructive  of  one's  full 
enjoyment.  And  then  it's  expensive." 

"  But  you're  coming  with  me." 

"  Oh,  that's  very  kind ;  but  I'd  rather  pay  for 
myself,  unless  you're  very  anxious  to  be  generous. 
Two  amphitheatre  stalls,  Henry,  near  the  front,  if 
you  can  get  them.  I  won't  ask  you  yet  to  come  up 
to  the  slips,  though  that's  where  I  take  most  of  my 
opera.  Good-bye;  and  send  me  a  post  card  about 
meeting  you,  in  case  I  don't  see  you  on  Saturday." 

She  shook  his  hand,  and  was  gone  and  out  of  the 
house,  before  a  lethargic  footman  had  time  to  at- 
tend to  the  bell  that  his  employer  rang.  Henry 
himself,  peeping  out  between  the  curtains,  watched 
the  retreating  figure  until  it  turned  the  corner  of 
the  street,  and  then  returning  to  the  middle  of  the 
room  paced  restlessly  up  and  down  for  a  time,  with 
his  hands  clasped  tightly  behind  him  and  his  eyes 
on  the  ground.  Presently  he  knelt  swiftly  down 
on  the  carpet  by  the  armchair  in  which  his  guest  had 
sat,  and,  with  tears  in  his  foolish  eyes,  kissed  the 
arms  on  which  her  hands  had  rested  and  the  has- 
sock on  which  she  had  placed  her  foot.  The  foot- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     253 

man,  entering  inopportunely  to  remove  the  tea- 
tray,  would  have  surprised  him  engaged  in  these 
amorous  exercises,  had  his  master  not  craftily 
feigned,  by  sweeping  his  hand  over  the  carpet,  to 
be  looking  for  something  beneath  the  chair;  subse- 
quently speaking  to  the  man  of  a  gold  pencil 
dropped,  which  the  housemaids  were  to  seek.  It 
is  embarrassing  to  be  compelled  to  depict  one's  hero 
in  such  grovelling  and  sentimental  postures;  but  he 
was  young,  and,  what  is  more,  the  member  of  a 
race  whose  views  as  to  what  is  befitting  conduct 
for  a  man  when  emotionally  stirred  are  perennially 
diverting  to  us. 

For  the  first  time  since  their  acquaintance  had 
begun,  the  idea  of  marriage  with  Flora  openly 
marched  into  his  mind  and  entrenched  itself  inex- 
pugnably.  It  seemed  to  the  enamoured  gentleman 
manifest  that  his  previous  cardiacal  experiences 
had  been  the  foolish  delusions  of  one  too  anxious 
to  love,  before  having  realised  the  true  nature  of 
the  passion.  In  both  of  the  only  entanglements 
that  could  be  considered  at  all  serious,  it  was  the 
physical  aspect  of  the  matter  that  had  alone  ap- 
pealed to  him.  Yes;  he  acknowledged  now  that  it 
had  been  none  the  less  so  in  the  case  of  the  proud 
Miss  Beaufoy  than  in  that  of  Jeanne  Allard. 
Patrice  and  he  had  never  been  truly  joined  by  any 
spiritual  bond,  much  as  he  had  striven  to  believe  so; 
a  fact  that  had  become  instantly  patent  to  both 


254     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

when  the  first  opportunity  for  full  intellectual  in- 
tercourse had  arisen.  It  was  but  the  least  endur- 
ing portion  of  her  that  he  had  adored;  certain 
trivialities  of  form  and  colour  that  would  be  ex- 
changed at  no  distant  date,  no  doubt,  for  the  un- 
lovely pachydermy  of  Mrs.  Beaufoy.  Flora,  on 
the  other  hand,  had  drawn  him  from  the  first  by 
her  mental  qualities,  chiefly  if  not  altogether.  It 
was  the  love  of  her  wise  and  friendly  comradeship 
that  had  separated  him  so  swiftly  from  his  be- 
trothed and  bade  him  follow  her  into  a  hundred 
paths  in  life  utterly  remote  from  the  high  roads  to 
which  he  was  accustomed;  nor  was  it  until  this 
afternoon  that  the  bodily  attraction,  necessary  to 
complete  the  love  of  the  sexes,  had  frankly  dis- 
closed itself.  Yet  it  was  no  faint  longing  bred  of 
frequent  propinquity.  The  violence  of  it  had  been 
almost  overpowering;  had  as  nearly  as  possible 
precipitated  him  into  action  that  would  have  de- 
stroyed their  relations.  This  then  was  true  love; 
intellect  and  senses  inextricably  interwoven,  so  that 
it  passed  the  wit  of  man  to  say  which  was  warp 
and  which  woof.  The  surprise  of  this  remark- 
able discovery  was  as  great  to  Henry  as  if  it  was 
not  being  made  around  him  by  ten  thousand  other 
minds  at  the  identical  moment;  as  it  was  in  the 
beginning,  or  very  near  it,  is  now,  and  probably 
shall  be  for  a  considerable  time  to  come. 

But  marry  her  —  marry  her  ?     The  proposition 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     255 

seemed  simple  enough;  and  yet  his  mind  was  torn 
a  dozen  ways  by  doubt  and  convention.  She  would 
not  marry  him,  he  tried  to  say,  to  account  for  this 
indecision.  But  his  pride  and  intelligence  rebelled 
at  this  statement.  It  was  plain  she  liked  him  at  least 
as  well,  probably  better  than  any  of  her  other  male 
friends,  except  perhaps  Sutton;  and  the  Socialist's 
age  and  appearance  must  surely,  even  with  Flora, 
put  him  out  of  the  question.  With  the  least  con- 
ventional woman,  youth  and  strength  and  good 
looks  must  necessarily  start  with  a  considerable  ad- 
vantage. Then  she  was  lonely;  a  reason  for  many 
marriages.  Moreover  she  was  badly  off;  though 
he  did  not  believe  that  the  prospect  of  a  large  in- 
come would  offer  any  very  strong  inducement  to 
an  acceptance.  Still  it  probably  counted  for  some- 
thing. And  however  levelling  and  democratic  her 
creed,  she  must  indeed  be  an  unique  specimen  of 
her  class  if,  in  the  depths  of  her  heart,  she  was  quite 
unmoved  by  the  position  of  her  wooer;  or,  at  least, 
touched  by  the  sacrifice  he  was  making  in  asking 
her  hand.  For  to  marry  Flora,  there  was  no  de- 
nying, would  almost  undoubtedly  mean  cutting  him- 
self adrift  from  his  own  class;  throwing  over  all 
the  large  circle  of  pleasant  friends  that  he  had  ac- 
cumulated since  his  boyhood,  and  casting  himself 
into  an  entirely  new  stratum  of  life,  with  no  inti- 
mate but  his  wife.  It  was  not  that  Flora  was  not 
as  well-behaved  as  any,  better  educated  than  most, 


256     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

and  cleverer  than  all  of  them.  But  even  if  she  con- 
sented to  disguise  her  opinions,  which  was  little 
likely,  even  if  she  changed  them  when  changing 
her  station,  which  was  hardly  credible,  the  question 
as  to  where  he  had  found  his  bride  would  still  be 
asked,  and  a  misalliance  would  be  immediately  de- 
tected. Misalliances  may  with  patience  be  lived 
down,  where  the  contemned  partner  is  particularly 
imitative  and  compliant;  but  compliance  was  not 
Flora's  leading  virtue,  he  thought,  with  a  lover's 
smile  at  the  remembrance  of  an  impudently  tilted 
head  and  a  softly  defiant  voice.  Again  it  would 
be  possible  to  take  her  back  with  him  as  his  wife  to 
his  own  land,  where  in  the  present  extremely  agree- 
able and  no  doubt  indestructible  relations  between 
the  two  countries,  a  charming  English  Mees,  mar- 
ried or  unmarried,  aristocratic  or  canaille,  would 
be  likely  to  be  received  with  something  like  en- 
thusiasm. But  would  she  go  ?  Would  she  give  up 
all  her  interests  in  her  own  country  to  expatriate 
herself  permanently?  And,  if  not,  what  other 
course  was  open,  except  for  him  to  leave  his  proper 
circle  and  enter  one  which,  he  could  not  deny,  did 
not  at  the  moment  seem  at  all  an  adequate  sub- 
stitute for  that  to  which  he  was  accustomed.  It 
was  good  to  be  revolutionary,  brotherly  and  all  the 
rest  of  it  for  part  of  the  day,  in  theory,  with  the 
prospect  of  returning  home  at  will;  but  it  was  a 
different  thing  to  burn  one's  bridges  behind  one. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     257 

Henry  paused  in  his  walk,  as  the  full  realisation 
of  the  step  that  he  would  have  to  take  dawned  upon 
him,  and  stood  as  the  benighted  traveller  stands, 
haggardly  gazing  over  the  dark  precipice  at  the 
brink  of  which  he  has  hardly  contrived  to  stop  in 
time.  A  life  of  Suttons,  Miss  Perrys,  and  Mrs. 
Westbrooks;  of  Baer's  tea-shops;  of  interminable 
bothering  and  hard  work  over  political  and  social 
matters;  of  vain  attempts  to  win  a  footing  for  a 
perversely  revolutionary  wife  among  the  people 
whose  society  he  really  enjoyed  and  who  pitied  him, 
no  doubt,  as  one  who  has  taken  an  unfortunate 
false  step ;  invited  sometimes  to  dinners,  en  gargon; 
probably  precipitated,  as  some  form  of  rich  radical 
member,  into  the  House  of  Commons,  to  be  reviled 
as  a  renegade,  and  associate  with  abhorred  plutoc- 
racy; treated  as  a  pariah,  to  whom  his  rank  and 
wealth  were  worthless  as  unable  to  purchase  that 
consideration  and  awe  which  is  their  chiefest  and 
most  precious  use. 

By  this  time  poor  Henry's  brain  was  spinning 
with  the  whippings  to  which  he  subjected  it  from 
every  point.  Such  a  picture  of  his  life  was  suffi- 
ciently uninviting;  and  yet  the  gay- faced,  sweet- 
voiced  will-of -the- wisp  still  floated  temptingly  be- 
fore him  over  the  treacherously  green  marsh,  and 
his  feet  seemed  to  have  lost  the  power  of  standing 
still  to  allow  him  even  the  briefest  space  for  seri- 
ous consideration  of  his  peril.  He  sighed  fatal- 


258     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

istically;  for  the  present,  he  felt,  he  was  incapable  of 
any  scheme  or  resolution,  and  resigned  himself  as 
recklessly  to  the  stream,  as  his  friend  had  done  to 
save  a  child's  life.  One  thing  alone  was  certain 
among  all  these  divers  embarrassments;  Flora  was 
too  dear  to  him  to  be  cast  aside,  whatever  the  ulti- 
mate consequences  might  be.  Let  it  be  for  the 
future  to  decide  the  end  of  the  story;  for  the  pres- 
ent all  he  hoped  or  desired  was  the  speedy  advent 
of  their  next  meeting. 


X 

ONCE  wholly  resigned  to  the  influence  of  the 
Chelsea  artist  the  dcgringolade  of  the  Baron 
D'Albiac  was  necessarily  rapid  and  complete. 
Still  torn  by  conflicting  doubts  as  to  the  possibility 
of  marrying  the  object  of  his  infatuation,  he  was 
at  least  determined  to  make  himself  "  worthy  of 
her,"  as  he  fondly  phrased  it,  by  embracing  every 
article  of  her  creed;  political,  social,  artistic,  theo- 
logical et  tout  le  bataclan,  to  quote  Monsier  Lechat. 
The  natural  result  of  such  behaviour,  although  at 
first  he  failed  to  recognise  the  fact,  was  to  separate 
him  from  his  friends  hardly  less  suddenly  and  en- 
tirely than  the  marriage,  over  which  he  exercised 
his  mind  daily,  could  have  done.  He  was  not  con- 
stantly, or  even  very  frequently,  in  her  company; 
for  her  many  occupations  and  friends  monopolised 
the  greater  part  of  her  time,  and  he  was  jealous  of 
sharing  her  with  others.  But,  in  the  intervals  be- 
tween their  meetings,  he  could  not  often  so  far  vary 
his  mood  as  to  enjoy  the  occupations  proper  to  his 
condition;  and  it  became  notorious  that  Mr. 
D'Albiac,  although  well-known  to  be  in  London, 
was  refusing  invitations,  with  a  persistence  which 
deliciously  suggested  some  hidden  scandal.  Many 
ingenious  and  pleasant  stories  were  related  in  ex- 

259 


260     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

planation  of  this  state  of  things;  but  the  only  two 
sources  from  which  some  inkling  of  the  real  truth 
might  have  been  drawn  were  temporarily  stopped; 
the  Beaufoys  for  obvious  reasons,  and  Roddy 
Chalmers,  because  he  was  competing  in  a  motor 
race  round  Europe,  which  he  was  unlikely  to  win, 
having  through  an  oversight,  as  he  afterwards  ex- 
plained, started  the  wrong  way  round. 

The  cerebral  dialectics  over  the  marriage  question 
were  only  indulged  in  solitary  hours ;  while  he  was 
actually  in  the  presence  of  his  Flora,  he  swum  in  a 
bliss  that  he  hardly  endeavoured  to  disguise  from 
her.  Covent  Garden  Theatre  being  then  open  for 
a  season  of  music-drama,  Mrs.  Evans'  artistic  side 
was  displayed  uppermost  for  a  few  weeks;  and  she 
introduced  Henry,  from  various  uncomfortable  and 
crowded  positions  in  the  great  house,  to  certain 
extremely  serious  entertainments.  Probably  he 
had  attended  at  performances  of  most  of  them  be- 
fore ;  but  they  were  not  of  the  kind  dear  to  Patrice ; 
and,  for  any  recollection  he  had  of  them,  they  might 
have  all  been  entire  novelties.  With  such  an 
eminently  practical  nature  as  Flora's,  he  was  as- 
tonished to  observe  with  what  unnecessary  concern 
and  enthusiasm  she  partook  of  these  intricate  and 
generously  lengthy  dramas.  The  private  affairs 
and  misadventures  of  all  these  prolix  and  monoc- 
ular greybeards,  the  highly  ramified  love  tragedies 
of  these  hearthrug-clad  and  nightgowned  gentle- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     261 

men  and  ladies,  most  of  whom  did  not  appear  to 
have  lost  any  weight  through  their  troubles,  de- 
pressed or  exalted  Flora,  as  if  those  concerned 
had  been  members  of  her  own  family.  After  one 
particularly  trying  evening  in  the  hot  gallery,  dur- 
ing the  latter  part  of  which  Henry  had  almost 
screamed  aloud,  at  times,  in  a  sort  of  agitated  bore- 
dom, at  the  repeated  delirious  throes  of  a  sick  man 
on  a  couch,  attended  by  one  of  the  inevitable  grey- 
beards, who  confined  his  ministrations  to  pulling 
the  disordered  bedclothes  up  to  the  patient's  chin 
between  each  incomprehensible  attack,  Flora's 
cheeks  were  wet  with  tears,  and  she  was  not  able 
to  utter  more  than  a  few  broken  words  on  the  way 
home.  Oddly  enough,  too,  Henry  found  that  he 
himself  began  to  be  strangely  interested,  after  a 
few  performances,  in  this  welter  of  extraordinary 
sounds,  vast  and  complicated  scenery,  passionate 
and  uncomprehended  invective  and  grief,  and  oc- 
casional nerve-shattering  outbursts  of  orchestral 
riot.  His  homeward-bound  questions  to  Flora  on 
the  meaning  of  what  he  had  seen  became  less  duti- 
ful, more  frequent  and  more  spontaneous.  From 
the  abdominal  gruntings  and  bello wings  of  the 
greybeards,  from  the  crashes  and  polyphonic  con- 
fusion of  the  band,  from  the  extraordinary  inter- 
vals and  screams  of  the  soprani,  a  music  slowly 
distilled,  a  weird,  unforgettable,  unrememberable 
music,  that  worried  him  and  yet  drove  him  back, 


262     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

even  without  Flora's  companionship,  to  hear  more 
and  ever  more  of  it.  When  there  was  no  more 
available  opera,  he  took  to  following  the  same 
music  in  concert  halls;  and  here  occasionally  Flora 
joined  him,  insisting  on  these  occasions,  with  her 
usual  perversity,  that  they  should  be  seated  close 
under  the  roof ;  and  at  these  dizzy  altitudes  he  made 
his  first  acquaintance  with  the  A  major  symphony, 
and  sat  open-mouthed,  striving  to  attach  a  mean- 
ing to  the  tricksy  caprioles  of  Eulenspiegel,  or  the 
insoluble  riddles  of  Zarathustra. 

Even  more  heroic  was  his  dietary  reform.  At- 
tendance at  unloved  entertainments  had,  after  all, 
been  a  regular  feature  of  his  social  life;  but  sub- 
jection of  the  natural  appetites  was  a  daily  and  life- 
long discipline  for  which  he  had  had  as  yet  no 
practice  or  inclination.  It  astounded  him  to  dis- 
cover how  much  interest  he,  by  no  means  a 
gourmand,  must  have  taken  in  his  meals,  when  he 
observed  the  hardship  and  sense  of  loss  that  at- 
tended his  abjuration  of  feasting.  Flora  seemed 
provokingly  unconscious  of  the  sacrifice  he  was 
making  for  her,  whether  because  she  was  by  nature 
something  of  an  ascetic  or  had  become  so  by  long 
habit,  he  could  not  say.  It  mortified  him  at  times 
to  be  aware  of  the  rebellion  of  his  stomach  at  the 
insipidity  of  its  entertainment,  and  of  the  warm  de- 
sire for  a  comfortable  meal,  long-drawn  and  dain- 
tily served,  at  some  moment  when  his  friend  was 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     263 

saying  carelessly,  "  Well,  I  s'pose  we'd  better  get 
something  to  eat  somewhere  now,  because  I've  got 
an  appointment  in  ten  minutes,  and  I  expect  it'll 
keep  me  for  two  or  three  hours."  It  reminded 
the  delicately  nourished  Frenchman  of  nothing  so 
much  as  the  inconsiderate  behaviour  related  of  a 
famous  private  detective,  on  the  occasion  when  he 
invoked  the  assistance  pf  a  medical  friend  in  a  case 
of  crime,  on  the  distinct  understanding  that  after 
its  denouement  he  would  entertain  him  at  lunch; 
and,  after  a  most  athletic  morning,  during  which 
his  dupe  had  violently  arrested  several  dangerous 
criminals  on  his  friend's  behalf,  coolly  informed  the 
unhappy  Esculapian  that  there  was  just  time  to 
get  a  biscuit  before  going  to  hear  Sarasate  (in 
whom  it  is  inconceivable  that  the  worthy  doctor 
took  any  sort  of  interest)  play  at  St.  James'  Hall. 
However  it  seemed  an  unworthy  thing  for  a  man 
and  a  soldier  to  be  crying  out  for  his  comforts  and 
luxuries  in  the  face  of  this  feminine  austerity;  and 
he  made  it  so  much  of  a  pose  to  appear  equally 
unconscious  of  these  grovelling  desires  that  the 
thing  became  an  artistic  pleasure,  and  ultimately 
passed  into  a  habit  that  he  had  scarcely  a  wish  to 
break.  But  this  consummation  was  not  reached 
before  he  had  fought  down  many  regrets  for  the 
loss  of  the  amateur's  appreciation  of  fragrant  red 
wine,  subtly  spiced  dishes  and  the  rare  aroma  that 
tobacco  reserves  for  the  replete. 


264     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

As  a  citizen  he  went  from  bad  to  worse.  Fred 
Sutton,  a  man  of  a  diabolically  insinuating  interest, 
had  had  Henry  tossed  to  him  by  Flora,  as  a  biscuit 
is  tossed  to  a  dog;  and,  for  fear  of  offending  her, 
D'Albiac  submitted,  with  as  good  a  grace  as  he 
could  assume,  to  the  arguments  and  theories  of  her 
friend;  permitting  himself  to  be  introduced  into 
societies  and  clubs  of  like  heretical  opinions,  and 
joining  at  times  in  their  discussions,  with  the  dis- 
tressing result  that  he  came  away  on  each  occasion 
more  and  more  ashamed  of  his  own  comfortable 
circumstances,  which  he  had  come  to  regard  as  un- 
merited. The  consequences  of  this  wicked  in- 
gratitude for  the  manifold  bounties  that  had  been 
showered  upon  him  may  be  conceived;  little  by 
little  Henry  developed  into  that  justly  abhorred 
and  boycotted  personality,  "  a  traitor  to  his  class  " ; 
one  who  encourages  the  base  jealousy  and  incom- 
prehensible acquisitiveness  of  the  proletariat 
against  those  more  cultured  and  refined  sections  of 
the  community,  among  which  such  vices  are  prac- 
tically unknown.  Even  his  outer  man  began  to 
deteriorate;  sometimes,  horrible  to  relate,  he  hardly 
was  unmistakably  a  gentleman.  He  was  known  to 
have  put  his  comfortable  bachelor  house  into  the 
hands  of  agents  for  disposal,  to  have  been  deserted 
by  his  butler  in  consequence  of  his  revised  method 
of  life,  and  by  his  footman  and  valet  because  he 
took  no  steps  to  fill  the  vacancy  caused  by  the  first 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     265 

defection,  thus  rendering  the  household  one  in 
which  they  could  not,  with  proper  self-respect,  re- 
main. Shutters  appeared  at  the  windows  in  Cowley 
Street;  an  imaginatively  eulogistic  notice-board 
hung  before  it;  and  where  the  late  owner  now 
resided,  or  in  what  way  he  was  spending  his  con- 
siderable wealth,  remained  mysteries  to  the  society 
world.  His  appearances  in  any  civilised  part  of 
the  town  grew  rare  to  the  vanishing  point;  nor 
would  his  late  friends  have  thought  of  looking  for 
him  in  the  dingy  office  near  Holborn  Viaduct, 
where,  about  Christmas-time,  he  began  to  pass  part 
of  each  day,  concerned  in  activities  that  were  little 
better  than  criminal. 

The  marring  of  a  gentleman  makes  unpleasant 
matter  for  relation;  but  it  is  necessary  to  mention 
one  or  two  trumpery  details,  if  only  to  show  into 
what  absurdities  his  perverted  tendencies  inevitably 
led  him.  The  name  of  a  certain  Henry  Dalbiac 
came  into  public  notice,  in  a  manner  shortly  to  be 
described;  and  it  appeared  subsequently  that  this 
Dalbiac  of  January  was  identical  with  the 
D'Albiac  of  November.  Henry  had,  on  some  oc- 
casion, referred  with  natural  annoyance,  in  Flora's 
hearing,  to  the  insulting  carelessness  of  an  English 
friend,  who  constantly  addressed  letters  to  him, 
spelling  his  name  in  the  less  noble  manner ;  and  had 
elicited  the  unsympathetic  reply,  to  be  expected 
from  a  woman  of  her  class,  that  "  all  that  sort  of 


266     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

thing  struck  her  as  rather  trivial;  her  landlady 
made  up  her  weekly  book  under  the  name  of  Mrs. 
Heavens  or  Mrs.  Evans  quite  indifferently,  accord- 
ing to  the  fancy  of  the  moment;  and  as  long  as  it 
was  obvious  who  was  meant,  it  wasn't  worth 
bothering  about."  It  is  hardly  credible,  but  none 
the  less  true,  that  this  careless  and  plebeian  remark 
was  sufficient  to  cause  Henry  deliberately  to  vul- 
garise his  own  patronymic;  and  it  serves  to  display 
the  influence  that  the  painter  had  acquired  over  his 
character  in  hardly  a  less  degree  than  the  fact  that 
he  ceased  to  conform  to1  his  observances  as  a 
Roman  Catholic  without,  it  seemed,  embracing  any 
alternative  form  of  public  worship.  Like  many 
men  of  his  class,  he  had  always  regarded  religion 
more  from  its  political  than  its  spiritual  standpoint; 
and  it  was  this  view  of  it  to  which  Flora  took  ex- 
ception. 

"  If  you  must  believe  something  of  that  kind," 
she  remarked,  "  I  don't  want  to  interfere  with  your 
belief.  Everyone's  got  to  decide  that  for  himself. 
But  it's  outrageously  wicked  to  play  on  people's 
superstitions  for  social  reasons." 

There  was  a  play  running  at  that  time  in  London, 
an  adaptation  from  the  French,  which  emphasised 
the  cruelty  of  endangering  the  comfort  of  people 
in  their  theological  beliefs  by  revealing  one's  own 
infidelity.  A  priest,  who  was  one  of  the  principal 
characters,  decided  it  to  be  his  duty  to  present  a 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     267 

periodical  miracle  to  the  people,  rather  than  see 
their  unhappiness  at  being  told  that  it  was  a  sham. 
Henry  pleaded  this  authority,  but  received  only  an 
obstinate  reply. 

"  Truth's  the  only  possible  thing  to  cling  to ;  any- 
thing that  depends  on  lies  and  humbug  is  noxious 
and  doomed  to  disaster,"  she  maintained,  with  her 
dimpled  chin  in  the  air.  "  I  call  your  play  a  dis- 
gustingly immoral  one."  And,  as  usual,  the  com- 
pliant lover  was  quickly  of  the  like  opinion. 

Christmas-time  found  him  ensconced  in  an  ob- 
scure lodging  not  far  from  the  studio;  and  it  was 
here  that  he  hung  up  his  portrait,  when  it  arrived 
from  the  framemakers;  and  here  that  he  received 
Flora's  Christmas  present,  a  red-leather  copy  of 
"  Beauchamp's  Career,"  accompanied  by  a  note, 
containing  the  hope  that  the  Commander  would  be- 
come Henry's  favourite  "  hero  "  in  fiction,  as  he 
was  that  of  yours  very  sincerely  F.  Evans.  The 
value  that  the  Frenchman  attached  to  this  small 
volume  was  out  of  all  proportion  to  the  three  shill- 
ings and  sixpence  that  it  had  cost  the  purchaser; 
and,  although  the  luxurious  and  effulgent  beauty  of 
the  author's  style  seemed  at  first  likely  to  thin  his 
perplexed  reader's  glossy  hair,  it  was  not  long  be- 
fore his  enjoyment  of  the  story  aroused  an  unap- 
peasable hunger  for  more  from  the  same  great  pen ; 
and  he  had  shortly  added  a  trinity  of  womanhood 
to  his  theogony  —  Loveliness,  Wit,  and  Courage  — 


268     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

in  the  persons  of  Clara,  Diana,  and  Carinthia. 
So  far,  foolish  as  he  had  been,  Henry  had  not 
actually  committed  himself  beyond  recovery.  Sup- 
posing his  infatuation  for  Flora  to  have  passed  off, 
he  might  yet  have  returned  to  the  sphere  he  had 
previously  adorned,  and  "  no  questions  asked,"  as 
the  advertisements  for  lost  dogs  express  it.  But, 
about  the  middle  of  January,  a  blow  fell  on  the 
circle  of  his  acquaintance,  at  first  incredible,  but 
subsequently  to  be  confirmed,  which  destroyed  the 
last  hope  of  his  rehabilitation.  Another  of  these 
odious  disturbances  over  the  franchise,  which  had 
recurred  lately  with  disgraceful  frequency,  took 
place ;  and  among  the  casualties  was  Henry  Dalbiac, 
25,  no  occupation,  taken  prisoner.  A  very  clear 
case  of  obstructing  the  police  in  the  execution  of 
their  duty  and  of  attempted  rescue  having  been 
made  out  against  him,  the  magistrate,  who  took  a 
sound,  commonsense  view  of  the  enfranchisement 
question,  and  had  more  than  once  sternly  silenced 
the  prisoner's  impudent  attempts  to  defend  himself 
from  certain  of  the  accusations,  sentenced  the  fallen 
aristocrat  to  fourteen  days  in  the  second  division; 
adding  a  well-merited  eulogium  of  his  own  leniency, 
and  foreshadowing  the  most  far-reaching  and  awe- 
inspiring  improvements  of  the  present  law,  if  these 
manifestations  did  not  immediately  cease.  These 
remarks  having  been  greeted  with  "  applause  in 
court,"  distinctly  audible  to  the  Press  Agency  re- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     269 

porter  who  was  present,  the  convicted  fanatic  was 
removed  for  a  fortnight's  meditation  over  his  mis- 
deeds. 

Roddy  Chalmers,  returning  from  his  Continental 
trip  at  about  this  time,  was  one  of  the  first  people 
to  greet  the  malefactor  on  his  release;  and  his  ac- 
count of  the  lamentable  transformation  of  the  for- 
merly smart  and  popular  young  man-about-town 
caused  quite  a  nine  days'  wonder  at  the  dinner  and 
lunch  tables  that  he  frequented.  Patrice  received 
the  news  with  a  shuddering  silence,  which  she  de- 
clined to  break  by  the  expression  of  any  opinion. 
It  cannot  be  said  whether  she  congratulated  herself 
on  her  escape  from  a  man  of  these  atrocious  pro- 
clivities, or  whether,  which  is  more  likely,  she  at- 
tributed his  ruin  to  that  vile  woman  who  was  no 
more  than  a  name  and  a  vague  idea  of  infamy  to 
her.  No  word  could  be  drawn  from  her  on  the  sub- 
ject, although  her  maman  made  several  attempts  to 
discuss  it;  and  finally,  at  the  mere  mention  of  Hen- 
ry's name,  she  would  instantly  seek  the  privacy  of 
her  own  room.  Mrs.  Beaufoy  was  however  avid  of 
any  news  on  the  subject ;  and,  in  the  absence  of  her 
daughter  on  a  visit,  succeeded  at  last  in  capturing 
the  elusive  Chalmers  for  a  dinner  party,  at  which 
several  of  Henry's  old  friends,  including  Mr.  Col- 
man  and  Lord  Honiton,  were  present. 

"  Now,  let's  hear  somthing  about  this  unhappy 
Henry  D'Albiac,"  she  said,  as  soon  as  a  suitable 


270     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

silence  fell  on  the  table.  "  I'm  sure  you  can  tell 
us  all  about  it.  You've  got  such  extraordinary 
friends,  Roddy;  and,  besides,  you've  actually  met 
that  dreadful  person  that  he's  entangled  himself 
with." 

"  Oh,  yes !  Please !  "  cried  out  another  lady, 
from  lower  down  the  table.  "  Poor  Monsieur 
D'Albiac!  I  thought  he  was  so  nice  when  I  met 
him." 

"  I  always  thought  — I  always  said  —  and  in  this 
you'll  bear  me  out  I'm  sure,  Mrs.  Beaufoy,"  Lord 
Honiton  began,  weightily,  "  that  there  was  some- 
thing wrong  about  the  young  man.  In  the  position 
towards  your  family  that  he  then  held,  I  was 
scarcely  able —  " 

"  Oh,  but  he  was  quite  charming  and  sensible." 
his  hostess  interrupted  him,  "  until  he  met  this 
creature.  Poor  Henry!  I  was  very  fond  of  him. 
Have  you  actually  seen  him  since  he  disgraced 
himself,  Roddy?" 

"  What,  old  Jools ! "  answered  Chalmers  buoy- 
antly. "  Rather !  I  called  on  him  in  the  two-pair 
back  only  last  week." 

"  The  two-pair  back !  Capital !  "  cried  Mr.  Col- 
man,  shrilly.  "  Do  tell  us  where  it  is,  and  why 
he  lives  there." 

"  Why,  it's  in  a  side  street  off  Chelsea  Embank- 
ment. Bedroom,  sitting-room,  and  use  of  bath 
twice  a  week.  Probably  young,  musical  society, 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     271 

too,"  Roddy  added,  in  contortions  of  laughter, 
"  and  hot  dinner  with  the  family,  at  one,  on  Sun- 
days." 

"  With  the  family?  With  the  persons  who  keep 
the  lodging  house  ? "  asked  Honiton,  frowning 
heavily  at  the  suggestion. 

"  Oh,  of  course,  I  won't  swear  to  that,"  Roddy 
said,  with  a  spasm  of  gravity.  "  But  that's  what  I 
should  think;  and  fourteen  shillings  a  week  rent." 

"  Roddy !  "  protested  Mrs.  Beauf oy. 

"  It's  a  fact,"  he  maintained,  as  earnestly  as  if 
he  was  speaking  from  knowledge  and  not  imagina- 
tion. "  And  there  was  old  Jools  sitting  in  a  rum 
little  room,  furnished  with  kitchen  chairs  and  a 
portrait  of  himself  and  a  lot  of  Meredith's  novels. 
I  give  you  my  word  he  tried  to  palm  one  of  'em 
off  on  me,  but  I  told  him  I  hadn't  read  anything  for 
months  except  '  Where's  Master  ?  by  Csesar ' — 
hadn't  any  time  for  it.  Oh,  he's  lovely,  Mrs. 
Beauf  oy !  You  really  ought  to  call  on  him." 

The  jocosity  of  his  memories  was  so  extreme 
that  he  almost  choked  himself  to  death  in  an  en- 
deavour to  combine  excessive  laughter  with  con- 
tinuing his  meal. 

"  Is  he  so  very  odd  ?  You  don't  mean  he's 
mad?" 

"  Not  a  bit ;  at  least  not  really  mad.  I  mean  to 
say,  he  doesn't  think  he's  a  teapot  or  anything  — 
yet.  In  fact,  to  my  taste,  he's  a  jolly  sight  more 


272     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

amusing  than  he  ever  was  before,  and  that's  saying 
something  too,  because  he  was  always  rather  witty. 
But  you'd  hardly  know  him  now,  if  you  met  him." 

"  Why  not?     Is  he  altered  in  appearance?  " 

"  You  remember  what  lovely  clothes  Jools  al- 
ways wore,  don't  you?  I  used  quite  to  blush  for 
my  own  when  I  was  out  with  him.  Well,  he 
turned  up  the  other  evening  —  rushed  in  suddenly 
while  I  was  waiting  for  him,  pretending  he'd  been 
working  so  hard  that  he  couldn't  get  away  before 
—  in  an  old  shooting  coat  —  a  Norfolk  jacket  — 
with  the  belt  hanging  down  behind;  about  half  an 
inch  of  moustache,  and  his  hair  all  sticking  up  on 
end,  as  if  he  hadn't  brushed  it  for  a  fortnight. 
Sort  of  Great- What-is-it,  or  Woolly  Wonder  of  the 
Wild  West,  don't  y'  know?  Frightful  hurry  he 
was  in;  said  he  could  only  give  me  half-an-hour, 
unless  I  liked  to  come  and  dine  with  him  at  Miles', 
because  he'd  promised  Fred  Sutton  —  that's  an- 
other patient  —  to  go  to  a  meeting  of  the  Jolly 
Dynamiters,  or  something." 

"  Miles'  ?  Miles'  ? "  said  Mrs.  Beauf oy,  re- 
flectively. 

"Yes.  It's  a  place  where  you  sit  on  perches  and 
eat  nuts.  Jools  won't  eat  meat  now,  because  he's 
afraid  the  cow  will  say  he's  no  gentleman.  So,  of 
course,  I  went  with  him  to  Miles'  —  I'd  often  been 
before  with  other  people  —  and  he  kept  me  in  fits  all 
through  dinner ;  if  you  can  call  it  dinner.  And  we 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     273 

were  waited  on  by  a  jolly  good-looking  girl,  too," 
he  concluded,  with  a  reminiscent  sentimentality. 

"  But  is  he  really  an  anarchist  and  all  those 
dreadful  things,  as  people  say?"  asked  someone. 

"  Oh,  rather !  I  got  quite  nervous,  at  times,  at 
the  awful  things  he  said  he  was  going  to  do  to  us 
all,  presently;  and  I  told  our  little  waitress  not  to 
give  him  too  sharp  a  knife  to  cut  up  his  roast 
Prochick  with,  in  case  I  got  the  wrong  side  of  him, 
by  mistake." 

"  I  believe  you're  making  fun  of  us,"  cried 
Colman,  with  a  pretty  pout  of  dissatisfaction. 
"  You're  a  dreadful  tease.  Mrs.  Beaufoy,  don't 
let's  believe  him,  shall  we  ?  " 

"  Do  you  seriously  say,  Chalmers,"  Lord  Honiton 
said,  with  a  grave  lowering  of  his  voice,  "  that  in 
a  few  months  this  wretched  young  man  has  abso- 
lutely discarded  all  the  principles  that  safeguard 
his  Empire,  his  class,  and  the  faith  of  his  fathers, 
and  has  deliberately  made  himself  a  social  out- 
law?" 

"  I  don't  think  I  quite  said  that,"  Roddy  shrieked, 
upsetting  his  champagne  by  throwing  his  head  rashly 
forward  among  his  glasses.  "  I  say !  I'm  fright- 
fully sorry.  Shall  I  stand  up  for  the  rest  of  the 
meal?  No,  I'm  sure  I  didn't  say  that;  I  couldn't, 
even  if  I  wanted  to.  But  he's  got  every  sort  of  fad 
that  was  ever  invented,  if  that's  what  you  mean; 
and  seems  to  enjoy  'em." 


274     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  But  why?  I  ask,  why?  "  asked  the  peer,  spread- 
ing his  hands  abroad.  "  How  can  a  man's  whole 
sane,  healthy  point  of  view  — " 

"  But  Jools  hasn't  got  any  point  of  view,  my  dear 
sir.  He  does  whatever  Flora  Evans  tells  him,  like 
a  good  little  boy,"  Roddy  said,  rather  exhausted  by 
his  mirth,  and  easing  his  collar  with  one  finger. 

"  That's  the  person  who's  got  hold  of  him,"  Mrs. 
Beaufoy  explained,  behind  her  fan,  in  a  delicate 
sotto  voce,  to  her  nearest  neighbours.  Some  of  the 
men  appeared  to  prick  up  their  ears  a  little  at  this; 
and  a  young  married  woman  fulfilled  the  wish  of  the 
majority  of  the  guests  by  asking: 

"  And  have  you  ever  seen  her  ?  Is  she  so  very 
fascinating?  Beautiful?" 

"  Flora  ?  Oh,  no.  I  know  her  quite  well ;  I  like 
her  very  much." 

Mrs.  Beaufoy's  pinched  glance  was  expressive, 
but  Roddy  insisted. 

"  I  do,  really.  She's  a  real  good  sort ;  and  of 
course,"  he  added  in  a  discreet  manner,  in  view  of 
the  presence  at  the  table  of  one  virgin,  aged  forty- 
three,  "  she's  quite  respectable  and  all  that  sort  of 
thing." 

"But  if  she's  not  good-loking — "began  the 
same  lady  amazedly. 

"  I  didn't  say  she  wasn't.  She's  pretty  and  amus- 
ing and  that.  Only  she's  not  Cleopatra,  y'know; 
you  wouldn't  pick  her  out  among  a  crowd.  How- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     275 

ever,  poor  old  Jools  thinks  she's  splendid;  he  can't 
keep  her  out  of  his  conversation.  '  Flora  says  this  ' 
and  '  Flora  says  that '.  It's  quite  pretty  to  hear 
him." 

"  You  don't  suppose  he'll  marry  this  woman  — 
your  friend,  I  should  say,"  Mrs.  Beaufoy  asked,  with 
a  half-hearted  attempt  to  refer  to  her  politely.  "  I 
beg  your  pardon ;  I  forgot  for  the  moment  that  — " 

"  Please  don't  apologise,"  Roddy  cried,  staring 
wildly  about  the  room  with  a  grin  of  delight.  "  She 
is  a  woman  all  right.  At  least  she  wears  skirts,  so 
I  s'pose  she  is.  Yes,  I  expect  to  hear  they're  en- 
gaged before  very  long.  She's  a  widow;  older  than 
Jools ;  no  children.  It'll  be  a  pretty  good  match  for 
her." 

"  Good  Heavens !  "  ejaculated  his  shocked  hostess; 
and  quite  a  groan  of  incredulity  proceeded  from  one 
or  two  of  the  guests.  Colman  shook  his  head  from 
side  to  side,  smiling  feebly,  as  if  the  situation  was 
beyond  his  comment.  Only  Lord  Honiton  had  the 
heart  to  pursue  the  subject. 

"  And  is  she  a  lady  ?  Is  she  a  member  of  the 
same  class  as  D'Albiac?  " 

"  Lor'  no !  "  Roddy  answered,  cheerfully.  "  She's 
a  lower-middle-class  Scotch  girl,  and  married  an  en- 
gine driver  or  something  of  that  sort.  But  she  talks 
all  right,  and  knows  how  to  behave.  Sort  of  girl 
you  see  in  a  cash  desk,  or  behind  a  typewriter." 

Lord    Honiton    raised    his    hands    slightly    and 


276     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

dropped  them  on  his  knees  again.     There  seemed  to 
be  no  more  to  be  said  on  so  unnatural  a  union. 

"  I  say,  I  s'pose  it  really  was  D'Albiac  that  they 
sent  to  —  I  mean  to  say,  whose  name  we  saw  — 
one  of  the  young  men  guests  asked  rather  indis- 
creetly, considering  how  painful  the  pursuit  of  this 
side  of  the  subject  must  be  to  the  lady  who  was  so 
nearly  connected  by  family  ties  to  the  malefactor. 

"  To  quod  ?  That  was  Jools.  He  told  me  all 
about  it ;  the  food  was  pretty  beastly ;  but  he  wasn't 
fed,  like  a  hen,  with  a  foot-pump,  because  it  didn't 
occur  to  him,  I  s'pose.  Otherwise  he's  just  the  chap 
to  insist  on  it,  and  say  he  preferred  dining  that 
way." 

"  He  was  not  ashamed  of  it,  of  course  ?  He 
brazened  it  out,  did  he  ?  "  enquired  Lord  Honiton, 
with  a  sneering  disgust  at  such  effrontery. 

"  Oh !  He  was  quite  uppish  about  it ;  and  really, 
y'know,  it  was  rather  interesting.  He  told  me — " 

"  My  dear  Roddy,  I  don't  think  we  should  care 
for  poor  Henry's  prison  reminiscences.  I'm  afraid 
he's  done  for  himself.  Probably  this  young  woman, 
if  he  marries  her,  will  run  through  all  his  money  in 
a  year  or  so,  and  that'll  be  the  end  of  him." 

"  She'd  better  hurry  up  and  marry  him  then,  or 
there  won't  be  much  to  run  through,  as  far  as  I  can 
make  out,"  Chalmers  objected.  "  According  to 
what  he  told  me,  he  seems  to  be  slinging  it  about 
anyhow." 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     277 

The  presence  of  the  spinster  prevented  Mrs. 
Beaufoy  enquiring  outright  whether  this  prodigality 
was  due  to  the  harpy  into  whose  power  Henry  had 
fallen;  but  the  words  "On  her?"  were  so  plainly 
written  in  her  raised  eyebrows  and  indignant  mouth, 
that  her  guest  answered  them  as  though  she  had 
spoken  them. 

"  Oh,  no !  On  all  sorts  of  crazy  things.  I  didn't 
understand  more  than  half  of  'em.  Societies  to 
make  us  all  perfect  in  ten  minutes,  and  repopulate 
the  world  entirely  with  people  who  agree  with  all 
Jools'  new  fads.  All  that  sort  of  thing.  It  doesn't 
seem  to  matter  much  to  him  what  he  spends  his 
money  on,  so  long  as  he  gets  rid  of  the  responsibil- 
ity of  having  any.  I  suggested  helping  him  a  bit; 
that's  just  the  sort  of  job  I'm  really  good  at ;  but  he 
only  called  me  a  fool  for  my  pains." 

He  finished  his  narration  with  a  surprisingly  shrill 
scream,  and  plunged  forthwith,  without  any  logical 
transition,  into  a  discussion  of  the  performance  of  a 
well-known  Society  lady;  who,  in  the  holy  cause  of 
charity,  had  been  recently  regaling  crowded  audi- 
ences of  convivial  racing  men,  festive  clerks  and 
undergraduates  and  their  lady  associates  at  a  Lon- 
don music  hall,  with  a  generous  display  of  her 
corporeal  charms  and  of  the  slightly  rudimentary 
dancing  that  she  had  "  picked  up  "  from  a  charming 
professional  in  half-a-dozen  lessons ;  never  knowing 
before,  as  she  explained,  that  she  had  any  natural 


278     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

aptitude  for  that  sort  of  thing.  Even  in  Roddy's 
harmlessly  absurd  mouth  this  subject  became  a 
trifle  risque,  but  most  of  her  guests  were  so  enter- 
tained that  Mrs.  Beaufoy  had  not  the  heart  to  inter- 
rupt the  discussion;  the  more  so  as  it  killed  all 
further  conversation  on  the  subject  of  Henry 
D'Albiac,  of  whom  she  wished  to  hear  no  more. 
The  news  of  the  dissipation  of  his  fortune  was  all 
that  was  needed  to  confirm  the  opinion,  already  de- 
livered by  her  upon  him,  that  he  had  "  done  for  him- 
self." And  this  opinion  became,  before  long,  the 
general  verdict  of  Society. 

Meanwhile,  unconscious  and  careless  of  this  re- 
luctant condemnation  of  his  behaviour,  Henry  con- 
tinued his  new  life  of  self-education,  arduous,  un- 
paid work,  hasty  meals  and  undistinguished  com- 
panionship with  an  enjoyment  that  was  already  by 
no  means  wholly  due  to  his  desire  to  please  Flora 
Evans.  It  had  not  seemed  possible  to  him  that  he 
could  have  willingly  taken  up  such  a  career  for  its 
own  sake;  foregoing  all  those  graceful  pursuits  that 
had  previously  filled  his  life  so  pleasantly.  He  be- 
gan to  find  the  world  out  to  be  a  terribly  interesting 
and  complex  place;  filled  with  the  blackness  of  un- 
dreamt-of horror,  pain  and  sorrow;  but  shot  across 
and  across  with  the  bright  lights  of  self-sacrifice 
and  courage.  From  this  newly  discovered  continent 
his  previous  idle  oasis  seemed  to  recede  until  it  be- 
came of  a  smallness  almost  invisible  and  negligible. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     279 

That  ceaseless,  objectless  dance,  as  he  thought  of  it 
in  his  perverted  frame  of  mind,  had  nothing  to  do 
with  the  great,  sweating,  groaning,  gallantly  strug- 
gling world,  that  was  ever  gaining  another  inch  of 
foothold,  tearing  away  yet  another  of  the  myriad 
bonds  that  prevented  it  putting  forth  its  full 
strength,  and  straightening  itself,  little  by 
little,  from  a  bowed  and  bound  giant  to  a  vic- 
torious Titan,  erect,  free  and  rejoicing.  The 
dance  was  but  the  foolish  play  of  epheme- 
ral gnats  about  the  contorted  and  damp  body 
from  which  they  draw  their  life;  a  wave  of 
whose  mighty  hand  would,  before  long,  drive  the 
useless,  irritating  crowd  away  for  ever.  It  has  been 
said  before  that,  when  Henry  was  diverted  on  to 
any  path,  he  would  pursue  it  to  its  end,  of  his  own 
accord,  with  all  his  strength  and  swiftness;  and,  al- 
though Flora  was  directly  responsible  for  the  sub- 
versive and  strenuous  activities  into  which  he  had 
thrown  himself,  he  was  amused  at  times  to  find  that 
the  very  interest  of  his  work  made  his  visits  to  the 
painter  fewer  than  they  had  been  before. 

Still,  however,  he  had  a  good  deal  of  her  society, 
and  each  successive  hour  passed  with  her  strength- 
ened the  resolution,  over  which  his  mind  had  at  first 
been  so  wearily  exercised,  to  take  her  as  his  wife. 
It  was  plain  that  her  opinion  of  him  was  im- 
measurably improved  since  his  downfall.  The  ele- 
ment of  mischief  was  almost  entirely  absent  now 


280     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

from  her  attitude  towards  him ;  although  there  were 
times  when  it  momentarily  revived,  when  some 
moribund  characteristic  of  his  former  self  lifted  its 
feeble  head.  The  frank  and  unsentimental  friend- 
liness with  which  she  treated  him  was  still  unaltered ; 
but  he  could  not  doubt  that  more  lay  behind  it,  did 
he  choose  to  draw  the  veil  from  it.  In  the  early 
months  of  the  year  his  tongue  faltered  a  hundred 
times  on  the  very  threshold  of  a  declaration ;  and  as 
many  times  crept  abashed  away  before  the  smiling 
and  apparently  unconscious  good-fellowship  with 
which  the  tentative  overtures  were  received.  Some 
special  incident,  some  particularly  favourable  or  ro- 
mantic environment  or  opportunity  was  necessary  to 
give  him  the  heart  to  take  the  plunge.  He  who  had 
been  so  thoroughly  at  ease  in  what  he  had  previously 
considered  affairs  of  the  heart,  even  when  they  were 
of  such  a  nature  that  he  ran  the  risk,  in  declaring 
himself,  of  an  indignant  or  grieved  rebuff,  was  now 
as  tongue-tied  as  a  schoolboy  making  his  first  ad- 
vances, over  the  garden  wall,  to  the  girl  with  the 
plaits,  who  lives  next  door. 

A  late  frost,  at  the  beginning  of  March,  suddenly 
threw  London  into  an  unwonted  carnival  of  skating. 
For  the  best  part  of  a  week  the  sky  above  was  of  a 
soft,  clear,  apricot  colour,  the  ground  beneath  one's 
feet  ringing,  cracking,  and  glistening,  and  the  orna- 
mental waters  in  the  Parks  crowded  with  holiday- 
makers.  On  the  Saturday  afternoon,  Flora  called 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     281 

at  Henry's  rooms  and  carried  him  off  with  her  to 
the  Kensington  Gardens,  with  an  invitation  to  sub- 
sequent tea  in  the  studio.  The  Round  Pond  was 
packed  with  people ;  and,  after  a  vain  attempt  to  find 
space  to  skate,  Flora  gave  up  the  effort,  and  amused 
herself  in  watching  the  endless  files  of  merrymakers 
travelling,  in  every  attitude  of  confidence  and 
anxiety,  down  the  long  slides.  Standing  beside  her, 
as  absorbed  in  the  spectacle  as  herself,  Henry  could 
hardly  believe  that  he  was  among  dull,  melancholy 
Londoners.  These  poor  folk,  for  whom  so  slight 
and  rare  amusement  is  provided,  were  changed  in 
the  briefest  space  to  a  gay,  laughing,  shrieking, 
genial  crowd  that  would  have  befitted  any  Conti- 
nental town.  Over  and  above  the  unusual  excite- 
ment of  having  something  definite  to  do,  be- 
sides hanging  about  the  streets,  witnessing  cine- 
matographic exhibitions  or  drinking  in  public- 
houses,  there  was  abroad  the  special  exhilaration 
that  is  induced  by  three  things  alone:  swimming, 
skating,  and  mountaineering.  The  air  was  so  full  of 
laughter  and  merriment  that  the  Gardens,  for  a  quar- 
ter of  a  mile  about  the  water,  hummed  like  a  busy 
hive.  Rosy  shop  girls  and  servants,  smart  clerks  and 
drapers'  assistants,  screaming  children,  piped  and 
capped  workmen,  mature  and  bulky  uncles  and  fa- 
thers, anaemic  dressmakers,  tall  youths  from  Univer- 
sities or  public  schools,  even  fat  elderly  mothers  of  the 
working  class,  passed  before  the  eye  in  an  endless, 


282     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

rapid  procession;  holding  each  other  up;  knocking 
each  other  down;  calling  out  encouragements,  jeers 
and  triumphant  taunts;  finishing  at  the  end  of  the 
slide,  as  often  as  not,  through  the  fall  of  a  single 
person,  in  one  enormous,  struggling  heap,  from 
which  the  component  parts  emerged  breathless, 
bruised,  but  with  unruffled  tempers.  And  among 
and  around  all  hordes  of  demon  boys  flickered  and 
squirmed,  full  of  mischief  and  excitement;  a  general 
and  yet  indulgently  tolerated  nuisance  to  the  whole 
community. 

It  was  as  pleasant  a  sight  as  Henry  had  ever  seen ; 
and  he  took  from  it  a  new  and  pathetic  knowledge 
of  what  this  sad,  northern  people  might  become 
under  only  slightly  different  conditions.  Flora  be- 
side him  was  full  of  the  spirit  of  the  ice;  her  eyes 
danced  and  crackled;  and  her  laughter  at  each  new 
harmless  disaster  was  sweetest  music  in  her  lover's 
ears. 

"  I  can't  stand  still  any  longer,"  she  cried,  at  last. 
"  Come  on,  Henry.  Let's  find  places  in  the  line." 

"  Slide  ?  "  he  asked,  with  a  momentary  astonish- 
ment, and  yet  with  a  warm  desire,  too,  in  his  voice. 

"  Slide,"  said  Flora  firmly,  and  was  gone  from 
his  side  and  waiting  at  the  top  of  the  course  for  her 
opportunity  before  Henry  had  time  to  say  another 
word  on  the  subject. 

The  next  moment,  as  he  hurriedly  followed  her, 
he  saw  her  take  a  short,  swift  run  and  fly  smoothly 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     283 

down  the  slide,  with  the  same  address  that  she 
seemed  to  bring  to  all  bodily  exercises ;  feet  together, 
arms  hanging  easily,  and  body  erect.  Pressure 
from  behind  and  encouraging  cries  sent  Henry,  an 
instant  afterwards,  gliding  in  the  wake  of  the  slim, 
white- jerseyed  figure;  and  the  exhilaration  of  the 
thing  made  him  instantly  forget  that  there  was  any 
other  duty  in  the  world  than  to  travel,  in  this  breath- 
less rush,  down  the  narrow,  slippery  path,  turn  at 
the  end  and  run  seriously  back  with  all  speed  to 
await  one's  next  turn.  For  a  good  half -hour  they 
continued  the  sport;  sometimes,  travelling  too  fast 
for  those  who  preceded  them,  they  rushed  unavoid- 
ably into  their  backs,  and  carried  total  strangers  in 
their  embrace  to  the  goal;  sometimes  the  like  fate 
befell  themselves  from  more  athletic  persons  behind 
them.  A  dozen  times  at  least  they  were  knocked 
down;  and  on  these  occasions  Flora  showed  ex- 
traordinary speed  and  address  in  rolling  out  of  the 
way  of  the  oncoming  procession,  and  picking  her- 
self up,  smiling  philosophically,  as  a  school-boy  does 
on  such  occasions. 

Henry,  weightier  and  less  adroit,  was  not  always 
so  fortunate,  and  on  more  than  one  occasion  the 
Baron  D'Albiac  of  Chateau  D'Albiac  found  himself 
the  base  of  a  hot  and  violently  agitated  heap  of  the 
lieges,  male  and  female;  and,  strange  to  say,  ac- 
cepted the  misadventure  as  amusing.  The  mad- 
ness in  the  air,  the  utter  disappearance  of 


284     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

conventionality  and  class  distinctions,  filled 
Henry  with  a  desire  to  settle  his  fate  at 
once.  He  wished  to  be  a  man  of  the  people;  to 
call  a  woman  of  the  people  his  wife ;  to  be  one  of  the 
great,  patient  crowd,  fundamentally  so  brave  and 
cheerful  and  lovable,  even  in  the  conditions  that  Na- 
ture and  a  mistaken  social  system  have  jointly  forced 
upon  them.  This  slender,  boyish  creature,  with  her 
laughing,  open  face,  her  easy  clothes,  soft,  untidy 
hair  and  swift  grace,  was  to  his  newly  born  spirit 
the  one  woman  in  the  world  capable  of  making  him 
an  ideal  companion.  He  must  not  lose  her ;  he  must 
not  let  her  out  of  his  sight  again  until  he  had  made 
sure  of  her.  A  retrospective  terror  as  to  what  might 
have  happened  in  the  past  through  his  foolish  hesi- 
tation came  over  him  and  filled  him  with  contempt 
for  his  want  of  resolution. 

Dusk  began  to  fall,  and  Flora  regretfully  pro- 
posed that  they  should  return  to  her  rooms. 

"  I  haven't  enjoyed  myself  so  much  for  years," 
she  sighed,  beating  the  snow  out  of  her  skating  cap. 
"  We  must  come  up  again  to-morrow,  unless  it  thaws 
to-night.  Can  you  ?  " 

He  agreed,  with  a  rapturous  anticipation  of  what 
was  to  happen  between  then  and  now.  To-day  they 
were  friends ;  to-morrow  they  might  be  —  must  be, 
should  be  —  betrothed  lovers.  The  fateful  question 
nearly  escaped  from  him  in  the  noisy,  unromantic 
streets  on  the  way  home;  and  when  Flora,  as  was 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     285 

a  habit  with  her,  took  him  momentarily  by  the  arm 
to  impress  some  point  on  him,  he  almost  fondled  the 
little,  warm  hand,  in  prophetic  proprietorship. 

At  the  corner  of  the  Fulham  Road,  as  they  were 
waiting  to  cross,  a  woman,  who  was  slowly  passing 
them,  stopped  suddenly,  looked  into  D'Albiac's  face, 
and  said  quickly,  "  Henry !  " 

The  young  man,  recognising  in  a  flash  that  it  was 
his  associate  in  his  brief  career  of  consolatory  dissi- 
pation, Miss  Kitty  Wilson,  turned  his  face  quickly 
away  from  her,  and  made  an  unsuccessful  attempt 
to  cross  the  road,  under  the  very  nose  of  a  van- 
horse. 

The  next  moment  Flora  touched  his  arm. 

"  Henry,"  she  said,  casually,  "  there's  somebody 
speaking  to  you." 

Miss  Wilson,  suddenly  realising  that  the  French- 
man was  not  alone,  had  moved  discreetly  away,  and 
Henry  made  an  effort  to  pass  the  matter  off. 

"  Some  mistake.     Come  on,"  he  said,  reddening. 

There  was  a  look  of  watchfulness  and  resolution 
in  Flora's  eyes. 

"  No,  please,"  she  said.  "  She  called  you  by  your 
name.  Do  go  and  speak  to  her.  There's  no  hurry ; 
you  can  follow  me  on ;  I'll  walk  slowly." 

Henry  gave  a  fling  of  annoyance ;  the  more  so  that 
he  saw  that  Miss  Wilson  was  looking  back  at  them. 
But  he  knew  Flora  too  well  to  resist. 

"  Oh,  yes !     Of  course,"  he  said  awkwardly.     "  I 


286     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

didn't  see.  All  right ;  I'll  follow  you  in  a  minute." 
Flora  nodded  and  crossed  the  road,  while  he 
moved  impatiently  after  the  retreating  figure  of  his 
dyspeptic  friend.  It  struck  him  that  she  looked 
shabby  and  worn,  and  her  face,  as  she  smiled  at  him, 
was  pale;  and  the  sight  immediately  quenched  his 
rising  fire  of  anger  at  this  awkward  rencounter. 


XI 

THE  interview  between  Dalbiac  and  his  former 
friend  proved  unexpectedly  long,  for  Flora  had  been 
a  sufficient  time  in  her  studio  to  boil  the  water  for 
tea,  before  his  foot  was  heard  upon  the  stair  and  he 
entered,  with  a  drawn  and  serious  face;  a  contrast 
to  the  cheerful  countenance  with  which  he  had  left 
the  Kensington  Gardens.  He  sat  down  in  silence  in 
the  saddle-bag  chair  which  Flora  reserved  for  the 
use  of  her  guests,  being  herself  one  of  those  lively 
personalities  for  whom  lounging  has  no  charm,  and 
received  his  tea-cup  from  her  hands  with  quite  a  per- 
functory smile.  Clearly  something  had  happened 
that  had  temporarily  diverted  his  mind  from  its 
pleasant  recollections  and  anticipations ;  for  he 
scarcely  glanced  at  his  friend's  attentive  face  as  he 
thanked  her. 

"  Nothing  wrong,  I  hope?  "  she  asked,  softly. 

Henry  gave  a  little  start,  and  seemed  to  shake  him- 
self together. 

"  Nothing  at  all,  thanks,"  he  replied,  with  a  more 
natural  smile.  "  I  was  only  wool-gathering." 

"  Bread  and  butter?     Who  was  your  friend?  " 

"  Oh,  just  a  woman  I  used  to  know,"  Henry  said, 
blushingly,  with  a  slight  frown  at  her  stupidity  in 
asking. 


288     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  So  I  supposed,"  Flora  answered  whimsically. 
"  A  woman  you  usedn't  to  know  would  hardly  have 
greeted  you  in  the  street  by  your  Christian  name. 
Who  is  she?  Not  one  of  your  old  set,  is  she?  " 

This  inquisitiveness  surprised  him,  for  she  was 
usually  the  reverse  of  curious ;  and  it  struck  him  with 
a  sudden  rapture,  mixed  with  slight  discomfort, 
that  she  was  jealous.  There  was  madness  in  the 
thought ;  the  delirium  of  confident  love. 

"  I  can't  tell  you,"  he  said,  in  a  low  voice,  hoping 
that  she  would  now  have  the  good  taste  to  drop  the 
subject. 

"  Why  not  ?     Don't  you  know  her  name  ?  " 

"  Of  course  I  do.  I  mean  that  —  that  she's  not 
the  sort  of  woman  I  can  discuss  with  you,  Flora; 
that's  all.  Please  don't  ask  any  more  about  it." 

Flora  was  by  this  time  perched  in  an  uncomfort- 
able and  temporary  manner  on  a  high  stool,  without 
a  back,  that  she  used  sometimes  in  connection  with 
her  standing  desk;  and,  with  her  feet  on  the  rungs 
and  her  small  toes  turned  ungracefully  inwards,  was 
drinking  her  tea  in  little  sips,  watching  Henry,  with 
serious  eyes,  over  the  edge  of  her  cup. 

"  I  can't  imagine  any  sort  of  woman  that  it'd  be 
impossible  to  discuss  with  me,"  she  replied,  with 
obstinate  good-humour.  "  However,  of  course,  I've 
no  right  whatever  to  pry  into  your  affairs.  I  apol- 
ogise for  being  indiscreet.  I  know  that  I'm  inclined 
to  be  too  confidential  for  lots  of  my  friends." 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     289 

The  slightly  humble  pout  that  accompanied  the 
apology  was  cleverly  managed,  and  had  the  intended 
effect  of  throwing  Henry  into  immediate  explana- 
tion. 

"I  like  to  tell  you  everything;  you  know  that," 
he  cried.  "  But  there  are  subjects  that  one 
can't  — " 

"  You  mean  one's  ashamed.  But  that's  silly. 
One  can't  undo  what  one's  done  by  hiding  it." 

"  It  isn't  only  that,"  he  protested.  "  With  a 
lady  —  with  a  woman  —  it's  not  possible — " 

"  Oh !  What  stuff  and  nonsense !  "  Flora 
laughed.  "  At  my  age,  and  with  my  experience ! 
Well,  Henry,  if  you're  so  excessively  modest,  I  can 
break  the  ice  for  you  by  beginning  the  subject  my- 
self. Your  friend  was  some  old  lover  of  yours  that 
you  wanted  to  avoid  meeting;  because  you'd  got 
tired  of  her  long  ago,  probably;  and  she's  in  trouble 
of  some  sort,  and  that's  worrying  you." 

D'Albiac  sighed. 

"Partly  true.  The  poor  thing's  been  ill,  and  has 
lost  any  small  savings  she  had,  and  doesn't  know 
where  to  turn.  But  she  was  never  my  lover, 
Flora." 

"What  then?  A  relation?  She  called  you 
'  Henry'." 

The  Frenchman  reddened;  wishing  devoutly  that 
Flora  was  either  less  dense  or  less  inquisitive. 

"  Don't  you  understand  ?  "  he  mumbled.     "  Men 


290     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

are  coarse  and  horrible,  I  know.  She  was  just  an 
episode  of  — " 

"  Well,  but  that's  what  I  mean  by  lover,"  Flora 
replied,  unabashed.  "  Presumably  you  felt  some 
sort  of  emotion  for  her  once.  She's  one  of  these  un- 
happy women  that  your  beautiful  male  system  of 
organising  society  has  driven  into  a  loathsome  trade. 
Poor,  poor  girl!  What  are  you  going  to  do  for 
her?" 

"  I  gave  her  some  money,"  he  replied,  rather 
sulkily. 

"How  much?" 

"  A  couple  of  pounds.  I  hadn't  any  more  on  me. 
Besides  — " 

"  Did  you  tell  her  where  she  could  find  you,  in 
case  she  wanted  you  ? "  Flora  persisted,  relent- 
lessly. 

He  remembered,  with  a  sense  of  guilt,  that  he 
had  managed  to  convey  the  idea  to  Miss  Wilson  that 
he  was  only  passing  through  London. 

"  No,"  he  answered.  Women  did  not  understand 
these  relations;  how  should  they?  And  it  was 
therefore  useless  to  enter  into  an  argument  on  the 
subject. 

Flora  blushed  and  frowned  a  little,  and  her 
dimpled  chin  went  up. 

"  Men  are  extraordinary  creatures  in  some  ways. 
I  don't  hope  ever  to  understand  their  views  on  these 
things.  Here's  a  girl  who's  practically  been  your 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     291 

wife;  one  of  a  class  that  your  sex  has  deliberately 
created  for  your  amusement,  and  maintain  by  every 
ingenuity.  She  falls  ill  and  is  at  her  wits'  end  how 
to  live;  and,  as  you  didn't  succeed  in  avoiding  her 
entirely,  as  you'd  hoped,  you  give  her  two  pounds 
and  escape;  not  caring  tuppence  what  happens  to 
her,  so  long  as  she  doesn't  bother  you  in  any  way. 
And  you're  rather  an  exceptionally  good-hearted 
man!  Where  does  she  live?  " 

"Why?"  he  asked,  ashamed  and  angry  at  the 
rebuke. 

"  I'm  going  to  see  her,"  Flora  answered,  pushing 
her  hair  back  from  her  face  defiantly;  and  Henry 
gave  quite  a  bound  at  the  words. 

"You  can't,"  he  gasped.     "You  can't,  Flora!" 

"Can't  I?  I'm  going,  all  the  same.  If  you,  a 
friend  of  mine,  won't  behave  decently,  I  must  do  it 
for  you.  How  do  you  know  what  crime  or  what  — 
what  beastliness  she  may  drift  into?  A  woman 
who's  been  your  lover !  " 

Unreasonable  as,  in  his  inmost  heart,  he  took  this 
point  of  view  to  be,  Henry  was  as  much  struck  with 
admiration  of  Flora's  angry  reproof  as  he  was  now- 
adays by  all  her  actions.  How  pretty  and  brave 
was  her  indignation  for  her  sex !  How  fine  her  de- 
fence of  it,  even  if  the  point  of  view  was  impractica- 
ble! And,  moreover,  he  had  not  felt  easy  in  his 
own  mind  about  Kitty;  the  tale  of  her  misfortunes 
was  a  dismal  one  enough,  and  was  amply  borne  out 


292     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

by  her  shabby  clothes,  haggard  cheeks,  and  the  de- 
spairing smoulder  of  her  fine,  sad  eyes.  Without 
another  moment  of  reflection  he  sprang  from  his 
chair  and  came  towards  the  artist,  on  her  high  stool, 
with  his  face  crimson  and  his  eyes  blazing. 

"  Flora,  you're  the  best  woman  in  the  world !  "  he 
cried,  stretching  out  his  hands  to  her.  "Of  course, 
you're  quite  right.  You're  always  right.  I've  been 
a  brute  to  do  anything  to  support  such  a  vile  state  of 
things,  I  know;  we're  all  brutes,  we  men  —  all  of 
us.  But  it's  all  over  and  done  with,  as  far  as  I'm 
concerned ;  I  swear  it  is.  And  I  am  really  ashamed 
of  the  way  I've  treated  this  girl  —  Kitty  Wilson. 
Tell  me  what  to  do  about  her,  and  I'll  do  it,  what- 
ever it  is.  Tell  me  what  to  do  about  anything, 
Flora,  and  I'll  do  it  at  once.  Why,  you  know  I 
don't  live  for  anything  but  to  please  you,  and  do 
what  you  think  is  —  what  is  right.  I  love  you  bet- 
ter than  everything  in  the  world;  you  know  that. 
Won't  you  forgive  me  for  what's  over?  I  haven't 
been  any  worse  than  most  men,  I  think ;  and  I  mean 
to  be  whatever  you  like  to  make  of  me.  Flora,  you 
will  —  you  will  take  me,  won't  you?  " 

He  stood,  trembling  from  head  to  foot,  with  his 
hands  still  stretched  out  imploringly  towards  her, 
jerking  out  his  spasmodic  phrases  almost  in  sobs, 
and  staring  with  passionate  hope  into  the  bright  blue 
eyes,  beneath  high  arched  brows,  that  gazed  back  at 
him  with  an  obvious  surprise  at  this  sudden  declara- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     293 

tion,  that  was  repeated  in  the  parted  lips  and  rosily 
bright  cheeks. 

"  Marry  you,  do  you  mean  ?  "  she  asked  presently, 
in  a  puzzled  tone. 

"  Yes,"  he  gasped,  the  tears  springing  suddenly 
from  his  beseeching  eyes ;  and  the  next  moment  had 
sunk  down  on  the  ground  before  the  stool,  and 
dropped  his  handsome  head  in  humble  adoration 
over  the  small,  swinging  feet. 

His  lips  had  hardly  touched  her  warm,  brown- 
stockinged  instep,  however,  before  Flora  slid  hastily 
from  her  perch  and  retreated  to  the  window,  where 
for  a  moment  she  stood  gazing  at  him,  as  he  re- 
mained on  his  knees  by  the  stool,  his  eyes  downcast 
to  conceal  his  childish  weakness. 

Presently,  as  she  did  not  seem  inclined  to  break 
the  silence,  he  rose  from  his  abject  position  and, 
swallowing  his  unshed  tears,  confronted  her  with 
better  courage,  the  first  shattering  plunge  being 
taken.  After  all,  her  swift  retreat  from  his  homage, 
her  very  silence  might  be  held  to  be  exactly  what 
was  to  be  expected ;  even  encouraging.  A  few  mo- 
ments of  masterful  insistence  and  passionate  appeal, 
and  the  field  was  won.  Before  he  could  open  his 
lips,  however,  to  sue  for  his  answer,  Flora  spoke 
herself. 

"  I  am  sorry,"  she  said,  softly  and  heartfully.  "  I 
never  dreamt  of  such  a  thing,  Henry.  Please  believe 
that.  How  should  I?  And  yet,  I  don't  know.  I 


294     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

suppose  it  was  stupid  of  me;  I  ought  to  have 
guessed." 

She  returned  to  her  high  stool,  slowly  climbed 
upon  it,  and  sat  for  a  moment,  gazing  out  of  the 
window  at  the  twilight  southern  sky,  fading  from 
pale  lemon  to  cobweb  grey,  though  her  eyes  plainly 
saw  no  outward  objects. 

Henry  made  a  desperate  effort  to  burst  in  on  her 
meditations  with  a  flood  of  impassioned  pleading 
that  should  sweep  all  before  him,  but  there  was 
something  so  sad  and  concerned  in  Flora's  face,  now 
pale  and  calm  again,  that  he  searched  his  mind  in 
vain  for  means  of  expression. 

"  I've  always  looked  on  you  as  quite  a  boy,"  she 
said,  slowly.  "  And  thought  of  you  one  day  find- 
ing some  nice  girl  of  your  own  age  to  replace  Miss 
Beaufoy.  But  me!" 

"  You ! "  Henry  suddenly  cried,  passionately. 
"  Only  you  in  the  world,  Flora.  I'm  not  a  boy,  I'm 
a  man.  And  I'm  not  speaking  on  a  sudden  impulse. 
I've  known  for  weeks  —  months,  now,  that  you're 
the  only  woman  I  can  ever  care  for.  Oh,  Flora! 
I  do  love  you  so !  " 

The  unfortunate  swain  realised  that  this  conclu- 
sion was  slightly  impotent ;  but  the  words  seemed  to 
be  beyond  his  control ;  and  all  his  carefully  precon- 
ceived eloquence  was  to  seek. 

"  I  believe  you  do,"  she  said,  turning  her  eyes  on 
to  his  flushed,  agitated  face,  with  a  compassionate 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     295 

look.  "  I'm  sure  you  do ;  though  I  don't  quite  see 
why.  However,  there's  no  '  why '  in  these  things. 
Poor  Henry!" 

For  the  first  time  since  his  determination  to  ask 
her  to  marry  him  had  taken  full  possession  of  him, 
his  heart  gave  an  agonising  drop  that  took  away  his 
breath,  and  he  felt  himself  begin  to  shiver  again, 
this  time  with  a  curious  sense  of  chill  fear,  instead 
of  with  the  unbearable  excitement  that  had  shaken 
him  a  few  minutes  before. 

"  But  you  —  you  will  marry  me?  "  he  managed  to 
say,  panting. 

"  Oh,  no,"  replied  Flora,  shaking  her  head  a  lit- 
tle, and  still  contemplating  his  face  with  the  same  re- 
gretful look.  "  Oh,  no.  I  couldn't  really." 

"  You  won't  ?  "  he  cried,  wide-eyed  and  pale. 
"  That's  all  you'll  say  to  me?  Just  that  you  won't? 
You  don't  like  me  a  bit  ?  " 

"  Yes,  I  do.  I  like  you  very  much.  And  I'm 
proud  of  you,  too;  you've  been  a  great  credit  to 
me,"  she  replied,  with  a  suggestion  of  her  sly 
smile. 

"Then  why?  Why  not?"  stammered  Henry, 
confusedly. 

Flora  dimpled  a  little  more  pronouncedly. 

"  A  man  may  not  marry  his  grandmother,"  she 
reminded  him. 

"  How  can  you  be  so  absurd  ?  "  Henry  said,  with 
unexpected  crossness. 


296     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  Grandfather's  wife.  Wife's  grandmother," 
added  Flora  reflectively. 

"  I  didn't  think  you'd  laugh  at  me.  You  might 
at  least  be  sorry  for  me,"  poor  Henry  remonstrated 
desolately,  with  moist  eyes. 

"  I'm  not  laughing  at  you ;  and  I'm  dreadfully 
sorry,  particularly  as  I'm  afraid  it's  largely  my  own 
stupid  fault.  But  I  haven't  thought  of  such  a  thing 
for  so  long  —  it  seems  so  absurd  in  connexion  with 
myself,  nowadays.  Sit  down  and  let's  talk  about 
it." 

The  discouraged  lover  dropped  miserably  down  on 
an  upright  wooden  chair;  there  seemed  to  be  no 
smallest  hope  left  in  his  heart,  although,  he  tried  to 
believe,  she  had  said  nothing  that  made  his  case  ut- 
terly desperate;  and  he  detested  his  stupidity  in  be- 
ing unable  to  find  an  immediate  plea  to  make  her 
withdraw  her  refusal. 

"  You  see,  Henry,"  said  Flora,  "  I  really  am  much 
too  old  for  you,  to  begin  with  — " 

"  What  nonsense !  "  he  protested  angrily.  "  You 
don't  look  a  day  older  than  me." 

"  I'm  thirty-one,"  she  informed  him.  "  And 
you're  twenty-five.  But  that  doesn't  represent  the 
real  difference  in  age.  With  your  life  and  my  life, 
I'm  at  least  twenty  years  older  than  you." 

"  But  when  I  say  that  I  swear  I'll  never  marry 
anyone  else — "  he  began,  in  tones  of  despairing 
appeal. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     297 

"  I  know.  Oh!  If  that  was  the  only  objection, 
I  might — .  Lots  of  unsuitable  marriages,  as 
they're  called,  turn  out  all  right,  like  Mahomet's; 
although  there's  a  risk,  of  course;  and  it's  always 
rather  a  tragedy  to  see  a  young  man  tied  to  a  mid- 
dle-aged woman,  to  knock  all  the  fun  out  of  things 
for  him." 

"  You  talk  as  if  you  were  about  seventy,"  he  broke 
in,  indignantly. 

"  Well,  I  know  I'm  not  quite  decrepit  yet,"  she 
admitted,  laughing.  "  But,  as  I  said,  that's  not  the 
real  objection.  I  don't  love  you.  I  like  you  very 
much  as  a  friend ;  as  much  as  almost  any  of  my  men 
friends.  But  I'm  not  in  love  with  you." 

A  flash  of  suspicious  rage  illuminated  the  despair- 
ing depths  of  his  mind. 

"  I  s'pose  it's  Fred  Sutton  that  you're  in  love 
with,"  he  said  bitterly.  "  No  doubt  you  like  him 
better  than  me." 

"  I  think  I  do,"  Flora  agreed.  "  It  isn't  unkind 
to  say  that,  is  it?  You  see  I've  known  Fred  for 
years,  and,  really,  I'm  fonder  of  him  than  of  any- 
body else  I  can  think  of,  except  his  wife,  who's  per- 
haps my  best  friend." 

"Wife?"  Henry  cried,  amazedly,  with  a  slight 
renascence  of  hope.  If  Sutton  was  out  of  the  run- 
ning, there  might  be  a  chance  for  himself  yet. 
"  Wife?  I'd  no  idea  he  was  married." 

"  Oh,  yes.     He's  married  all  right,  and  has  two 


298     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

boys,  almost  grown  up.  In  the  ordinary  course,  as 
a  friend  of  mine,  you'd  have  seen  Helena  Sutton 
pretty  constantly;  only,  for  the  past  few  months, 
she's  been  over  in  Canada  and  the  States,  lecturing." 

"  Then  who  is  it  that  you  like  better  than  me?  " 
he  asked,  dismally. 

"  I've  told  you  —  Fred,  and  some  of  my  women 
friends.  But  I'm  not  in  love  with  anybody,  if  that's 
what  you  mean,  and  I  never  shall  be." 

"  You  shall,"  he  cried,  with  manly  courage. 
"  You  shall  love  me,  Flora." 

She  shook  her  head,  smiling ;  and  the  undisturbed 
calm  of  her  triangular  face  was  more  dispiriting 
than  any  protests  could  have  been. 

"  In  time,"  he  urged.  "  If  I  don't  worry  you 
about  it,  if  I  — " 

"  I  hate  to  have  to  disappoint  you,  Henry,"  Flora 
said,  with  a  ring  of  unfeigned  sorrow  in  her  voice. 
"  But  it'd  only  be  cowardly  and  selfish  to  let  you 
deceive  yourself.  No  time  —  nothing  that  you  can 
do,  could  possibly  make  any  difference." 

"  Am  I  so  utterly  uninteresting  and  unpleasant  to 
you?"  he  asked,  with  a  sparkle  of  ill-temper  and 
wounded  pride. 

"  You  don't  understand.  How  should  you  ?  "  she 
asked,  mournfully.  "  You're  young,  and  you  think 
that's  the  only  thing  in  the  world.  And  you've  not 
been  lucky  in  love,  so  far.  First  Miss  Beaufoy; 
then  me." 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     299 

"  Only  you,"  he  protested.  "  I  never  was  really 
in  love  with  Patrice,  and  as  soon  as  I  met  you  I 
knew  it'" 

"  Do  you  mean  that  it  was  because  of  me  — ?  " 
Flora  asked,  with  startled  eyes  and  distressed  lips. 

"  Of  course  it  was,"  he  answered,  with  a  mirth- 
less laugh.  "  She  gave  me  up,  theoretically;  but  it 
was  all  my  doing.  I  loved  you,  Flora." 

"  Heavens !  What  a  tangle ! "  she  cried,  in 
humorous  despair.  "  Henry,  I'm  quite  over- 
whelmed ;  I  am  indeed.  I  wish  —  I  genuinely  wish 
I  could  think  it  possible  for  me  to  give  you  what 
you  want.  If  I  could  think  it  would  make  you  per- 
manently happy,  I  almost  believe  I  — " 

At  this  first  sign  of  surrender,  Henry  sprang 
radiantly  to  his  feet  and  seized  her  hands  impul- 
sively. 

"  It  would.  You  know  it  would.  I  don't  ask 
any  more  than  that,"  he  urged  her. 

Flora  did  not  try  to  withdraw  her  hands,  but  her 
expression  was  unalterably  calm. 

"  I  didn't  mean  to  encourage  you,"  she  remon- 
strated. "  Please  don't  think  it's  any  pleasure  to 
me  to  play  with  you.  I  want  you  to  be  quite  unde- 
ceived, at  once.  It  isn't  possible.  It  isn't  really." 

She  was  so  obviously  entirely  sincere  and  immov- 
able that  he  dropped  the  unresponsive  hands  and  re- 
treated to  his  chair. 

"  How  can  you  know  positively?     Why  can't  I 


300     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

even  be  allowed  to  hope  ?  "  he  asked  rebelliously, 
devoutly  wishing  that  his  voice  would  not  break  and 
quaver  in  so  contemptible  a  manner. 

"  Because  it'd  only  be  prolonging  your  unhappi- 
ness,  you  silly  fellow,"  she  said,  smiling.  "  Think, 
Henry.  I've  known  you  now  for  months,  and  we've 
seen  rather  an  unusual  lot  of  each  other,  what  with 
the  sittings  and  so  on.  It's  never  occurred  to  me, 
in  all  that  time,  to  think  of  you  with  the  least  ap- 
proach to  sentiment.  You're  good-looking  and 
pleasant  and  rather  clever;  you've  got  a  good  heart 
and  some  ideals.  But  I've  known  all  that  a  long 
time.  There  can't  remain  anything  important  to 
discover  in  you.  What  you  are  to  me  now  I  hope 
you  always  will  be;  but  it's  absolutely  inconceivable 
that  you  should  ever  be  any  more." 

"  I  see,"  he  ejaculated,  brokenly,  on  the  verge  of 
another  attack  of  tears. 

"  You  mustn't  take  it  too  much  to  heart,  please," 
she  urged  him  anxiously.  "  I'm  not  in  the  least 
worth  bothering  about.  The  world's  full  of  much 
nicer  and  younger  and  cleverer  and  better-looking 
people  than  me.  Only  you  happen  to  have  been 
thrown  up  against  me.  It  isn't  only  you  that  I 
couldn't  love ;  the  whole  idea  is  unthinkable  for  me. 
There's  practically  no  chance  that  I  shall  ever  fall 
in  love  again,  or  wish,  for  any  other  reason,  to 
marry." 

Henry  did  not  answer.     Her  tone  was  so  reason- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     301 

able  that  he  knew  argument  was  vain;  so  sympa- 
thetic that  he  could  not  even  have  the  meagre  con- 
solation of  being  offended  or  affronted. 

Flora  climbed  off  her  high  perch  and  ensconced 
herself  in  the  deep  armchair,  crossing  one  knee  over 
the  other  and  lying  back  lazily. 

"  Console  yourself  with  a  cigarette,  if  you've  got 
one,"  she  recommended  him,  "  and  I'll  tell  you  why 
I'm  so  positive,  as  you  say.  It's  not  that  I  think 
love  and  marriage  are  undesirable  things;  I've  as 
high  an  opinion  of  them  as  you  have.  In  fact,  it's 
because  I  have  so  high  an  opinion  of  them  that  I 
know  they're  not  to  be  repeated,  for  me." 

"  Other  people  —  some  of  the  best  of  people  — 
have  repeated  them,"  he  argued. 

"  Oh,  it's  only  a  matter  of  temperament,  I  know. 
P'raps  I'm  rather  self-contained  by  nature  —  like 
the  cheap  flats.  My  own  society  and  my  own 
thoughts  content  me  a  good  deal ;  I'm  never  unhappy 
for  want  of  sympathy  or  companionship,  although 
I  like  both.  There  isn't  the  inducement  of  loneli- 
ness, you  see,  that  drives  most  people  into  second 
marriages.  If  ever  there  was  a  touch  of  it,  I  out- 
wore it  years  ago." 

There  was  a  new  pathos  in  her  voice;  the  tran- 
quil sadness  of  memory,  the  painless  regret  for  past 
days.  She  continued  speaking  in  phrases,  now  long, 
now  short,  with  little  pauses  between;  moments  of 
abstraction ;  glances  about  the  room,  at  the  windows, 


302     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

at  Henry's  face.  For  his  part,  he  sat  attentive,  but 
irresponsive;  the  agony  of  his  refusal,  the  excite- 
ment of  his  declaration  were  over,  and  he  had  the 
almost  pleasant  melancholy  of  one  meditatively 
seated,  on  some  serene  Summer  evening,  by  the 
quiet  grave  of  some  long  dead  friend. 

"  I  don't  know  how  they  can  bear  it  —  the  second 
marriage  people,  I  mean.  It  must  be  a  dreadful 
hunger  for  sympathy  and  love  than  can  induce  them 
to  go  through  it  all  again,  when  they've  been  happy 
the  first  time  .  .  .  and  it's  notorious  that  those 
are  the  very  people  who  do  it.  ...  I  don't 
know  if  you  know  about  my  married  life  ?  " 

Henry  shook  his  head. 

"  It  wasn't  ...  it  was  only  a  short  one.  I 
met  my  poor  Bill  when  I  was  at  South  Kensington, 
as  a  student,  when  I  was  nineteen;  he  was  a  few 
years  older.  We  weren't  very  well  off ;  but  we  had 
two  years  together  that  were  better  than  most  peo- 
ple have.  I  think  we  were  extraordinarily  well 
suited  ...  it  was  really  odd  we  should  have 
met.  I  don't  remember  that  we  ever  had  any  seri- 
ous difference  of  opinion  in  those  years,  except  one ; 
and  that  was  the  one  that  .  .  .  that  spoilt 
everything." 

"  You  mean  you  parted  ?    You  quarrelled  ?  " 

"  No.  Bill  and  I  never  had  a  real  quarrel ;  Bill, 
p'raps,  was  hardly  capable  of  quarrelling,"  she  said, 
looking  up  with  raised  brows,  and  appearing  to  re- 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     303 

gard  the  statement  almost  with  the  surprise  of  dis- 
covery, "  which  was  odd,  too ;  for  he  had  very 
definite  opinions.  But  we  disagreed  about  that  hor- 
rible war  in  South  Africa.  To  Bill,  it  was  a  neces- 
sity; a  disgusting  operation  that  had  to  be  per- 
formed, for  the  sake  of  civilisation.  He  thought 
that  every  healthy  man  in  the  country  was  morally 
bound  to  lend  a  hand  to  finish  it  off  as  soon  as  pos- 
sible ...  I  don't  mean  that  he  caught  that 
ghastly  war- fever — 'Remember  Majuba!  '  and  so 
on  —  which  disgraced  the  country  then.  He  hated 
it,  but  he  felt  he  had  to  go.  ...  Well,  I 
begged  and  prayed  him  not  to  —  my  little  girl  had 
been  born  only  a  short  while,  and  I  was  still  laid  up. 
This  war  was  only  vile  to  me;  hateful  bullying;  a 
hypocritical  fraud  on  our  poor  credulous  people, 
engineered  by  a  crowd  of  money-grubbers;  almost 
without  excuse  .  .  .  and  miserably  mismanaged 
and  muddled  from  the  start.  Bill  went,  soon  after 
the  new  year  —  nineteen  hundred  and  one.  He'd 
only  been  out  there  a  week  or  two  when  he  was 
killed.  The  Yeomanry  got  into  a  skirmish  at  a 
place  called  Boshof,  and  my  poor  man  was  shot 
through  the  lungs." 

D'Albiac  looked  up  quickly,  with  the  feeling  that 
he  ought  to  say  something,  and  yet  conscious  that  it 
was  rather  ridiculous  to  offer  condolences  for  a 
tragedy  that  was  nearly  ten  years  old.  His  doubt 
was  set  at  rest  by  Flora,  however,  who  continued 


304     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

with  hardly  a  pause,  in  the  same  even,  soft  voice. 
"  So  there  I  was  left  alone,  with  my  baby  as  my 
only  companion.  Of  course,  I  knew  that  it  was 
silly  to  make  this  little  creature  too  much  to  me 
.  .  .  one  ought  to  keep  one's  head,  I  s'pose,  and 
not  put  all  one's  eggs  in  one  basket,  even  over  one's 
children.  But  it's  practically  impossible  to  avoid 
doing  it  in  a  case  like  mine.  As  soon  as  I  could  get 
about  ...  I  lived  for  a  time  on  the  money 
that  poor  Bill  had  insured  his  life  for;  it  wasn't 
much,  but  it  was  all  I  had  ...  as  soon  as  I 
was  strong  enough,  I  went  to  work  again.  I'd  al- 
ways stuck  to  it,  until  I  was  laid  up  over  my  child, 
for  Bill  didn't  make  very  much,  and  besides,  nat- 
urally, I  liked  to  help.  Now  it  was  all  I  had  to  keep 
myself  and  Betty  on.  Well,  those  were  lonely  days, 
particularly  at  first;  because  I  missed  my  man  so 
horribly,  and  I  had  hardly  any  friends,  then,  in  Lon- 
don, and  was  too  busy  to  make  more,  what  with  my 
work,  and  nursing  Betty,  and  keeping  our  two  rooms 
in  order.  .  .  .  But  by-and-by  I  got  to  love  my 
queer,  speechless  life,  almost  as  much  as  I'd  loved 
my  married  days.  It  was  fine  to  sit  in  the  evenings, 
after  my  work  was  done,  with  the  baby  on  my  knees 
and  my  tea  by  me  on  the  table,  and  tell  her  what  I 
was  going  to  make  of  her;  what  a  fine,  clever 
woman  she  was  going  to  be  —  High  School,  Col- 
lege, if  I  could  manage  it,  and  a  profession  or  art 
to  make  her  free  to  please  herself  about  love  and 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     305 

marriage.  .  .  .  And  when  she  began  to  speak 
there  was  no  end  to  the  fun  we  had.  .  .  .  She 
was  so  quick  and  clever;  just  like  her  father  in  every 
way  .  .  I  half  felt  it  coming;  I  was  haunted 
sometimes  by  a  sense  of  disaster,  because  I  knew  I 
was  attaching  myself  too  much  to  this  little,  frail 
bit  of  a  creature.  And  yet,  you  know,  one  has  a 
ridiculous  feeling  that  there  must  be  some  kind  of 
justice  in  the  world;  that  after  some  cruel  blow  has 
fallen,  one  has  taken  one's  share  of  the  world's 
tragedies,  and  probably  will  be  let  off  any  more  of 
the  worst  punishments  for  the  future.  ...  I 
couldn't  really  believe  that  I  was  to  be  the  victim 
again  so  soon;  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  was  a  harm- 
less sort  of  creature,  and  doing  my  best,  and  that 
someone,  something  ought  to  treat  me  moderately 
gently.  What  odd  superstitions  cling  to  one! 
.  .  .  She  was  barely  six  when  she  died  of  a 
quite  ordinary  child's  illness  —  scarlet  fever  —  and, 
for  some  minutes  after  I'd  been  told  it  was  all  over, 
it  seemed  so  inconceivable  that  I  wouldn't  believe  it 
—  told  the  doctor  he  must  have  made  a  mistake." 

Flora  stopped  speaking  and  glanced  at  Henry's 
face.  The  simple  gentleman  was  weeping  unaf- 
fectedly. Something  in  Flora's  calm,  outworn 
grief  was  more  horrible  to  him  than  any  expressed 
misery  could  have  been.  The  consideration  of  the 
long  agonies,  from  which  such  tranquillity  must 
have  emerged,  tore  his  soft  heart. 


306     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  I  don't  tell  you  this  to  depress  you,  you  kind 
person,"  Flora  said  affectionately.  "  It's  only  to 
make  you  understand  me  better  than  you've  done  so 
far.  That  was  four  years  ago;  I've  no  more  tears 
for  it  now.  I  see  the  world  more  clearly  than  I 
did  ... 

" '  Je  sais  que  vous  avez  bien  autre  chose  a  faire 

Que  de  nous  plaindre  tous, 
Et  qu'un  enfant  qui  meurt,  desespoir  de  sa  mere, 

Ne  vous  fait  rien,  a  vous. 
Je  sais  que  le  fruit  tombe    .    .    .' 

"  How  does  it  go?     . 

" '  Que  la  creation  est  une  grande  roue 

Qui  ne  peut  se  mouvoir  sans  ecraser  quelqu'un; 

Les  mois,  les  jours,  les  flots  des  mers,  les  yeux  qui  pleurent, 

Passent  sous  le  ciel  bleu; 
II  faut  que  1'herbe  pousse  et  que  les  enfants  meurent; 

Je  le  sais,  6  mon  Dieu ! ' 

"  I  say  it  horribly  ...  I  forgot  you  were 
French." 

"I  think  you  say  it  beautifully,"  Henry  replied, 
drying  his  eyes. 

"  But  then  you're  in  love  with  me,"  Flora  repre- 
sented, smiling,  "  so  you're  a  prejudiced  witness. 
Don't  be  sad,  poor  man;  I'm  not  unhappy  about  it 
myself  any  longer.  As  soon  as  the  worst  time  was 
over,  I  looked  about  for  some  new  ideal.  Up  till 
then  I'd  had  my  art  —  such  as  it  was  —  and  my 
family.  Now  I  was  reduced  to  public  interests;  or 
that  was  the  way  I  thought  of  it  in  those  days. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     307 

Henry,  I'm  sure  that  the  social  mind  is  the  true 
solution  of  all  our  unhappiness.  Men  have  been 
shutting  themselves  up  in  their  caves;  magnifying 
their  private  joys  and  sorrows,  and  shutting  their 
eyes  to  everyone  else's  for  untold  centuries.  When 
one  sees  a  whole  world  in  struggle  and  grief,  one 
hasn't  time  or  inclination  to  pet  up  one's  own  mis- 
fortunes. I  know  I've  done  practically  nothing  for 
the  world;  but  I've  tried  —  that's  the  main  thing; 
and  you  can't  think  of  the  consolation  it's  been  to 
me.  .  .  .  But  you  do  see  now,  don't  you,  that 
the  idea  of  deliberately  beginning  life  all  over  again 
is  out  of  the  question  for  me?  " 

"  If  you  fell  in  love  — "  Henry  suggested  de- 
spairingly. 

"  Yes.  Then  one  takes  any  risks,  or  plunges  into 
any  horrors.  But  I'm  not  in  love.  And  I'm  not  go- 
ing to  try  to  make  myself  fall  in  love,  with  you  or 
anyone  else.  As  I  said  just  now,  I  might  be  willing 
to  sacrifice  myself,  if  I  felt  any  conviction  that  I 
should  be  making  your  life  happy;  although  I  do 
think  I've  earned  a  little  peace  for  myself.  But  I 
don't  believe  I'm  indispensable  to  you;  although  I 
know  you  think  so  at  present.  You'll  get  over  it  in 
no  time ;  why,  at  your  age,  and  with  your  tempera- 
ment —  good  gracious !  " 

He  shook  his  head  miserably. 

"  Yes,  you  shall.  Don't  be  weak  and  foolish,  and 
make  us  both  unhappy,  Henry.  If  you're  fond  of 


3o8     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

me,  you  ought  to  try  to  be  brave,  for  my  sake  as 
well  as  your  own." 

D'Albiac  realised  that  all  hope  was  gone ;  and  a  re- 
bellious mood  seized  him  as  he  thought  of  the  curi- 
ous course  his  life  had  taken  since  his  chance  meet- 
ing with  the  arrested  rioter  at  the  corner  of  Down- 
ing Street,  eight  months  ago.  For  a  moment  he 
recaptured  his  old  habit  of  thought,  the  nature  of 
that  dead  Baron  D'Albiac,  fashionable  in  mind  as 
in  clothes;  intolerant  of  the  colourless  herd,  that 
was  chiefly  serviceable  as  a  foil  to  and  worshipper 
of  his  own  distinguished  set;  ceaselessly  and  agree- 
ably occupied  with  the  amusements  and  social  duties 
of  the  well-born  and  wealthy;  impeccable  in  his 
views  on  all  subjects.  And  he  found  himself  con- 
templating with  wonder  the  strange  beast  into  which 
he  had  been  metamorphosed,  wholly,  he  knew, 
through  the  influence  of  the  young  woman  who  had 
just  refused  the  honours  and  worldly  advantages 
that  he  had  humbly  offered  her. 

"  I've  given  up  a  lot  of  things  for  you,  Flora,"  he 
grumbled,  in  this  sudden  flash  of  amazed  self-rec- 
ognition. "  All  my  old  friends  and  amusements ; 
Patrice  ..." 

Here,  however,  he  broke  off,  feeling  that  regrets 
for  his  lost  betrothed  might  appear  too  obviously 
hypocritical,  in  view  of  his  previous  remarks  on  the 
subject.  Flora  looked  at  him  with  an  eye  that  be- 
gan to  sparkle  again  with  mischief. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     309 

"  Social  splendour,  laziness,  feasting ;  all  kinds  of 
fun  and  luxury;  and  you've  got  nothing  in  ex- 
change but  hard  work  and  crazy  ideals.  It's  true, 
Henry;  but  you  must  forgive  me,  for  I'd  no  idea, 
you  see,  that  you  were  only  changing  all  your  beliefs 
because  you'd  fallen  in  love  with  me.  I  flattered 
myself  with  the  conceited  belief  that  I'd  convinced 
you  by  my  godlike  reason.  You  know  you  pre- 
tended to  be  so  impressed  and  earnest  about  it  all, 
that  I  can't  really  be  blamed  for  not  suspecting  you. 
Besides,  where's  the  harm?  You've  still  got  your 
money,  or  most  of  it,  I  s'pose.  You've  given  up 
one  house;  but  you  can  take  another,  equally  fine; 
and  fill  it  even  fuller  than  before  with  idle  servants ; 
and  give  dinners  and  lunches  just  as  you  did  in  the 
brave  days  of  old.  And  a  little  hair  oil  and  a 
change  of  clothes  would  turn  you  back  into  just  the 
same  politely  condescending  person  who  saw  me  to 
my  'bus  that  first  night,  and  told  me  what  a  silly 
woman  I  was.  After  all,  it'll  be  an  amusing  episode 
to  look  back  on." 

Under  her  first  few  teasing  sentences,  Henry  had 
maintained  an  obstinately  sulky  silence ;  but,  before 
long,  he  began  to  writhe  with  impatience,  and  at 
this  point  broke  in  angrily. 

"  Flora,  you  are  a  little  brute ! "  he  cried,  crim- 
soning. 

The  artist  laughed  with  unrepentant  pleasure  at 
the  success  of  her  attack. 


310     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

"  Now  that's  the  proper  way  to  look  at  it," 
she  agreed.  "  I'm  delighted  to  see  your  spirit 
isn't  crushed.  Oh!  You'll  get  over  it  in  no 
time." 

"  You  know,"  he  persisted,  angrily,  "  that  I  was 
convinced.  It  wasn't  hypocrisy.  And  it'd  be  quite 
impossible  for  me,  now,  to  go  back  to  my  old  life; 
I  should  be  bored  to  death  in  a  week,  and  I  shouldn't 
be  able  to  stand  the  people  I  met." 

"  Then  you  prefer  to  be  as  you  are  ?  "  Flora  asked 
innocently. 

"  Of  course  I  do,"  he  said  shortly. 

"  Why,  what  harm  have  I  done  then  ?  I  don't 
see  that  you've  any  grievance  against  me;  on  the 
contrary,  you  ought  to  be  grateful." 

"  I  am,"  he  replied  humbly.  "  But  I  can't  help 
being  in  love  with  you,  can  I,  Flora  ?  And  being  in 
love  makes  one  selfish  and  exacting." 

The  note  of  mockery  dropped  out  of  her  voice 
and  face  in  a  flash,  as  she  came  over  and  laid  her 
small  hand  on  his  shoulder. 

"  Forgive  me,  and  be  friends,"  she  said  simply. 
"  The  other  isn't  possible ;  but  don't  think  I'm  not 
very  proud  and  touched  to  think  that  you  should 
feel  about  me  like  that." 

He  looked  up  and  tried  to  answer ;  but,  at  the  sight 
of  the  kind  blue  eyes  and  the  tender,  parted  lips,  he 
fell  only  into  a  fit  of  trembling  and  longing  that  for 
a  minute  left  him  dumb. 


THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC     311 

"  There's  nothing  to  forgive,"  he  said  at  last  halt- 
ingly, "  but  everything  to  be  grateful  for.  I  was 
stupid  —  vain,  I  suppose.  I  looked  forward  so 
much  —  I  felt  so  hopeful  —  Flora,  won't  you  let  me 
kiss  you  before  I  go?  Just  once  ...  it  isn't 
much  to  ask.  I  shan't  bother  you  again." 

The  delicate  face  at  which  he  gazed  up  passion- 
ately grew  a  shade  less  serious. 

"  Oh,  you  rash  person !  "  she  said,  shaking  her 
head.  "If  you're  really  in  love  with  me,  that 
would  only  make  you  a  hundred  times  unhappier. 
No,  oh  no,  Henry !  Try  not  to  think  of  me  in  that 
way  at  all." 

He  had  expected  no  other  answer  and  rose  un- 
steadily to  his  feet. 

"  Good-bye,  then,"  he  said  holding  out  his  hand. 
"  You  won't  ever  see  me  again." 

Without  taking  the  outstretched  hand,  she  stood 
looking  back  at  him  with  a  grave  regret.  Then  she 
gave  a  little  shrug. 

"  If  you  feel  that  you  can't  meet  me  without  un- 
happiness,  we  must  say  good-bye,  I  s'pose,"  she 
agreed.  "  But  you  won't  give  me  up  just  for  the 
sake  of  some  conventional  emotion,  out  of  books, 
will  you?  I  don't  see  why  in  the  world,  now  that 
you're  quite  sure  I  can't  ever  be  your  wife,  you 
shouldn't  be  content  to  keep  me  as  a  friend.  There 
must  be  lots  of  other  men's  wives  that  you  could 
easily  fall  in  love  with,  if  they  weren't  out  of  the 


312     THE  DECLENSION  OF  HENRY  D'ALBIAC 

question.  That  wouldn't  prevent  you  being  good 
comrades  with  them,  would  it?  " 

Henry  shifted  uneasily  from  foot  to  foot;  he 
knew  that  the  parting  he  had  suggested  was  utterly 
opposed  to  his  every  wish,  and  that  in  his  heart, 
putting  aside  the  correct  behaviour  in  such  cases,  he 
would  rather  keep  Flora,  even  as  the  most  distant 
of  acquaintances,  than  lose  her  altogether.  Appar- 
ently his  tell-tale  face  revealed  his  indecision,  for 
the  artist  gave  a  little  relieved  laugh. 

"  Think  it  over  reasonably  to-night,"  she  sug- 
gested, "  and  I'm  quite  sure  you'll  turn  up  here  to- 
morrow morning,  to  take  me  sliding  again." 

He  looked  up  and,  in  the  presence  of  that  laugh- 
ing face,  could  not  himself  forbear  to  smile,  al- 
though still  somewhat  ruefully. 

"  I  —  I  s'pose  I  shall,"  he  admitted. 

"  Of  course  you  will,"  Flora  said  gaily,  holding 
out  her  hand.  "  Friends  ?  " 

Henry  took  her  hand  and  pressed  it  heartily. 

"  Friends,"  he  replied. 


THE  END 


A    000  127824 


